Another Oscar season has come and gone and One Battle After Another was named best picture of the year. I won’t lie to you, I wouldn’t be able to write a full article about my thoughts on this years Oscars because I have no real original takes when it comes to the night. I thought Conan O’Brien was a fantastic host and I agree with most everything that won (or at least was happy with the result). It was a solid year for film and The Oscars awarded the correct people. It was so nice to finally see Paul Thomas Anderson get his flowers.

With that being said, every year I keep up with a list with what I would nominate for the calendar year. I have some differentiations with The Academy on some categories so it’s time to discuss those today. I did this last year in video form, you can watch that here. I’m writing an article this year because, a lot of projects on the horizon. But here’s that video from last year if you were interested ——

Without any further ado, let’s talk about my personal nominations.

Best Original Song

• ‘As Alive As You Need Me To Be’ - Tron Ares

• ‘My Baby (Got Nothing At All)’ - The Materialists

• ‘I Lied To You’ - Sinners

• ‘Last Time (I Seen the Sun) - Sinners

• ‘Train Dreams’ - Train Dreams

My winner in this category would be I Lied To You. I thought the performance at The Oscars was absolutely incredible and I was hoping it would win against Golden from Kpop Demon Hunters, a movie and song I particularly don’t care for. However, I am happy for the artists involved and find their story to be impactful, so I’m not too upset by it overall.

Best Score

• Bugonia

• The Fantastic 4: First Steps

• Marty Supreme

• One Battle After Another

• Sinners

My winner in this category is the Marty Supreme score by Daniel Lopatin, which might very well be my favorite score of the decade so far. This being snubbed for even a nomination let alone a win in my opinion is one of the worst Oscar snubs in history. This beautiful etherial score made me feel like I was floating in the theatre. I am glad Sinners won overall, I love that score as well but I do with the Marty Supreme score had gotten more love.

Best Sound

• If I Had Legs I’d Kick You

• Marty Supreme

• One Battle After Another

• Sinners

• The Testament of Ann Lee

If I Had Legs I’d Kick You was the most impressive sound work in a film last year, the sound acted as a character in the film and added so much to the films anxiety inducing nature.

Best Visual Effects

• Avatar: Fire and Ash

• The Fantastic 4: The First Steps

• Frankenstein

• How to Train Your Dragon

• Sinners

A boring category. The Avatar movies always look amazing and they continue to. I feel bad for other visual effects artists going up against Avatar and Dune films ever year but they are just simply undeniable.

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

• 28 Years Later

• Frankenstein

• The Smashing Machine

• Superman

• Weapons

Jacob Elordi has spent over 400 hours getting makeup on to become Frankenstein’s monster, this obviously deserved to win and I’m glad it did.

Best Costume Design

• Eternity

• The Fantastic 4: The First Steps

• Frankenstein

• Sinners

• Superman

Another obvious pick and deserved win for Frankenstein.

Best Production Design

• Bugonia

• Eternity

• Frankenstein

• The Fantastic 4: The First Steps

• Sinners

Okay, time to make my case now, how on earth was Fantastic Four snubbed for so many technicals this year? I think usually Marvel movie visuals are kinda sluggish but this was one of the most technically well crafted looking blockbusters I’ve seen in a long time! The movie overall is pretty good, but there’s no denying the world building and production design was a whole other level.

Best Editing

• Marty Supreme

• No Other Choice

• One Battle After Another

• Sentimental Value

• Sinners

I’m so happy Sentimental Value got the nomination for editing this year at The Oscars and it would be my personal choice to win. While movies like One Battle After Another and Marty Supreme have flashier editing, the Sentimental Value editing was so inventive in the way it constructed the story overall and it reallt stayed with me.

Best Cinematography

• Bugonia

• Marty Supreme

• No Other Choice

• Sinners

• The Testament of Ann Lee

The cinematography in Sinners was absolutely fantastic. Every shot was so lush and articulately crafted. It’s a worthy winner of the award. This is why I wanted to shout out another movie that should have been nominated in this category, The Testament of Ann Lee. This movie was one of the most gorgeous movies I saw last year and while I didn’t love it wholly as a narrative, the technicals were astounding.

Best Animated Feature

• Boys Go To Jupiter

• The Day the Earth Blew Up

• Dogman

• Elio

• Zootopia 2

Animated feature for me this year was lackluster. Like I stated before, I wasn’t huge on Kpop Demon Hunters. However, I really did love the micro-budgeted and under discussed film Boys Go To Jupiter, which was charming, poignant and so incredibly quirky. Seek it out!

Best International Film

• It Was Just An Accident

• No Other Choice

• Nouvelle Vague

• The Secret Agent

• Sentimental Value

I discussed it briefly in editing, but Sentimental Value is a movie I adore and was one of my absolute favorites of the year so it would be my choice here.

Best Casting

• Marty Supreme

• One Battle After Another

• Sentimental Value

• Sinners

• Superman

Marty Supreme had some of the most inspired casting choices of last year and it played on the meta nature of a lot of the talent very well (unfortunately that includes the insufferable Kevin O’Leary). Shoutout to Superman for having my favorite iteration of the character to date.

Adapted Screenplay

• Bugonia

• No Other Choice

• One Battle After Another

• Superman

• Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery

I absolutely adore the screenplay to One Battle After Another and I am so glad Paul Thomas Anderson finally won his Oscar, it is a worthy win. Since both screenplays are so close in my head, I will give my personal prize to the one that wasn’t even nominated (in any category this year) No Other Choice. This film has one of the tightest scripts I’ve seen in a while that consistently kept me guessing and enthralled through the whole film.

Original Screenplay

• Eddington

• Marty Supreme

• Sentimental Value

• Sinners

• Weapons

I have to go with Marty Supreme as my original screenplay winner, this movie was enthralling and consistently kept my attention for the whole runtime. It’s the fastest two and a half hour film I’ve ever seen and one that actually made me gasp multiple times when I watched it for the first time and that’s a rare thing for me to do with film these days.

Supporting Actor

• Jacob Eldori - Frankenstein

• Jacobi Jupe - Hamnet

• Miles Caton - Sinners

• Sean Penn - One Battle After Another

• Stellan Skarsgard - Sentimental Value

As much as I love Stellan Skarsgard in Sentimental Value, I think overall my choice would have to be Jacob Eldordi for being able to portray an iconic character and bring new layers of humanity to it. The dedication that performance took proves that Elordi is on his way to becoming one of the best actors of his generation.

Supporting Actress

• Amy Madigan - Weapons

• Elle Fanning - Sentimental Value

• Igna Ibsdotter Lilleaas - Sentimental Value

• Odessa A’zion - Marty Supreme

• Rachel Brosnahan - Superman

Igna Ibsdotter Lilleaas is one of the best supporting performances of the whole decade and while I love that Amy Madigan won for her chilling and iconic performance in Weapons, I do wish that Igna could have gotten more love this award season. I love that she was nominated for her quiet and emotionally devastating performance.

Best Actor

• David Corenswet - Superman

• Jesse Plemons - Bugonia

• Lee Byung-hun - No Other Choice

• Michael B. Jordan - Sinners

• Timothee Chalamet - Marty Supreme

Look, I know the whole controversy around Timothee Chalamet and his marketing campaign for Marty Supreme, but I also won’t sit back and say that Marty Supreme isn’t his best performance of his career and the best leading male performance of the year. I think things were overblown about his controversy and one day we will look back and understand that he probably should have won for this. That doesn’t take away the fact that Michael B. Jordan is deserving of the win as well, playing the two main characters of quite possibly the biggest success story for film of 2025, Sinners, and I’m really happy that he won the award.

Best Actress

• Chase Infiniti - One Battle After Another

• Jennifer Lawrence - Die My Love

• Jessie Buckley - Hamnet

• Renate Reinsve - Sentimental Value

• Rose Byrne - If I Had Legs I’d Kick You

This is probably the best best actress line up we have had in years. So many all timer performances here and Jessie Buckley was absolutely electric in Hamnet and was a worthy winner. However, Rose Byrne in my opinion gave one of the best performances I’ve ever seen if I Had Legs I’d Kick You, perfectly illustrating what it feels like to be in an anxiety spiral, it’s a performance that will never leave me.

Best Director

• Joachim Trier - Sentimental Value

• Josh Safide - Marty Supreme

• Park Chan-wook - No Other Choice

• Paul Thomas Anderson - One Battle After Another

• Ryan Coogler - Sinners

All great filmmakers who did terrific work but overall I have to give my pick to Paul Thomas Anderson, he knocked it out of the park with One Battle After Another like he does with the rest of his films and he finally won his much deserved Oscar.

Best Picture

I did make a post of my favorite films of 2025 you can read here —

I did put in another movie in my number ten slot I believe was deserving, but the rest of the picks remain the same.

• Bugonia

• Eddington

• If I Had Legs I’d Kick You

• Marty Supreme

• No Other Choice

• One Battle After Another

• Sentimental Value

• Superman

• Sinners

• Weapons

Yes, it’s the same choice I had in my article and I’ve given it praise throughout this post but I love Marty Supreme, it was a film that gave me everything I needed and reached out to me in a time I needed it to. It’s a profound statement on following your dreams but not letting them corrupt you. I wish it could have won at least one Oscar, but loosing everything it’s nominated for is very on brand for the film itself.

What are some of your picks? Comment down below!

Hoppers, the newest film from Pixar Animation Studios, is another triumph for an animation studio that has been delivering quality films since 1995 with the first Toy Story. The studio has remained a major player in the animation industry- even if they don’t have the track record they did in the early 2000’s. Twenty years ago, the Pixar canon felt like it could not be topped. They were consistently releasing what would go on as some of the greatest films ever made, films like Ratatouille, Up and Finding Nemo to name a few. The unfortunate weight put on the recent Pixar canon is living up to some of the greatest films of all time. I think within the 2020’s- they have made a few movies that stand up to the best of their filmography. Movies like Pete Doctor’s lush and transcendent Soul or Enrico Casarosa’s underrated and masterful Luca has shown plenty of life in the studio.

Yet, Pixar has struggled to maintain in the last decade with the culture wars. After the backlash of Lightyear, a movie with a confusing premise for a general audience, the studio decided to make a change within the company to try to make their films more ‘attainable to a general audience’ and less auteur driven. This is what led the film Elio to be made twice over, making significant changes to make the film have a wider appeal to the executives. Elio, a very charming movie in it’s own right, failed to gain much attention or box office revenue.

Hoppers has a lot to prove. It is the next original Pixar film to come out of the canon. It has a legacy to follow but it’s also coming out in a time where original animated movies are struggling. The movie itself, is a meta commentary on everything I’ve written about so far. The movie stars a girl named Mabel, who’s love for animals and nature makes her a passionate advocate for wildlife preservation. When she discovers the town’s mayor plans to destroy a dam that she and her late grandmother bonded over, she does everything in her power to save the dam. She discovers one night after trying to get a beaver to go into the dam that her science professor at school as created technology to go into the mind of a robotic beaver to communicate with the animals. She ends up hopping into the body of a robotic beaver and wild antics ensue as she tries to convince them of their impending peril.

Hoppers is the goofiest movie Pixar has ever made. The movie, directed by We Bare Bears creator David Chong brings his auteur sensibilities to Hoppers. The idea for Pixar to sanitize their content to a broader audience is not apparent in Hoppers. This movie doesn’t feel like the other Pixar movies in their canon, it has a voice of it’s own. It reminded me the most of the Pixar film Turning Red. There is a reckless cartoony energy in this movie that both share. Pixar in their early films liked to take a weird concept (like a rat cooking in a kitchen or an old man tying balloons to his house) and ground it to a reality to make us resonate with it on a human level. Hoppers isn’t trying to do that, it’s unabashedly a cartoon in the way Dreamworks movies operate and I admired that about the film. It’s arguably the funniest Pixar movie to date. The characters are charming, the humor is zany and irreverent and some of the gags in it are incredibly trippy. Pixar is trying something new here and I loved watching it. It was thoroughly entertaining.

Hoppers is likely to get a crowd of kids laughing at the slap sticky nature of it. The animals in this film operate at a minions level energy, which is why I think the film is going to be a big hit ultimately. Did all of this silly energy ultimately undermine the poignancy of the film? Not at all. The film is a major loud and broad statement at the ways capitalism and big business bullies the environment for personal gain. Mabel in the film is a radical activist. She’s loud, brash and demanding for social change. I believe the character is a great role model for kids to aspire to. I like the fact she’s going to college and she’s 19, she’s not just a kid she has more agency and life experience behind her. She’s not there for romance or affection, she’s here because she wants to make a difference. The friendship she makes with the leader of the beavers, King George, is a poignant connection that made me evaluate the movie on a deeper and more sociopolitical level. King George is a pacifist, a beaver who sees the good in the balance and order of things in nature. You just gotta eat, you just gotta build and you just have to survive. King George’s outlook is that there is good in everyone and resentment only causes self turmoil. Mabel in the film is filled with turmoil and rage because of her lack of agency and control over the demolition of a place she holds near and dear to her heart. She doesn’t feel heard. I believe for a lot of us who grew up in the Trump era, this feeling of hopelessness is palpable and relatable. We just want things to get better and no matter how loud we scream nothing gets done.

Both of these characters learn from each other throughout the film, they both have their own character arcs that had me wrapped up in it emotionally. They both learn about standing up for your land but also having compassion for people you may not agree with. The film I’m sure will have a few people call it ‘centrist propaganda’ but I didn’t read that from the end of the film. There’s obviously a correct side here and an incorrect side here. The film isn’t asking for compromises, it’s showing it’s possible to create branches (ha ha get it) to unlikely allies. The film has obvious heroes and villains and they are treated as such. The film is a great look at advocating for the right things and the grace and humility it takes to make make social change entirely about you and your feelings (a thing so many people forget nowadays).

Hoppers is a lovely movie and it’s a bold statement for Pixar to make. In an era where they are trying to make their films feel more universal to broader audiences, Hoppers is unabashedly weird and even at times uncompromising. The film has a weird dark sense of humor that had me cackling throughout. It’s the best Pixar film since Luca easily. I had a great time and it even gave me some stuff to ponder and chew on afterwards. Glad to see the best in the business still has their creative strive that made them some of the best.

This page is primarily used to discuss film and occasionally music - but I’ve made it a platform where I could write about whatever I would like to and I've had a goal to read at least twenty books this year - so lets start with a book I found to be absolutely captivating. Half His Age, written by Jennette McCurdy is about the story of a seventeen year old girl named Waldo who lives in a dysfunctional family situation. Her mom is always out, either working or out with some man, seeking validation. Waldo, in an attempt to finally feel heard - becomes infatuated with her creative writing teacher Mr. Korgi. The story chronicles Waldo as she navigates her own insecurities and growing pains of being a seventeen year old while being groomed in a toxic co-dependent relationship with her english teacher.

This book has already come out to immense controversy and divisive reviews, which is to be expected. Jennette McCurdy, who’s autobiography I’m Glad My Mom Died became a global phenomenon, did anything but play it safe with her first foray into fiction. That is to say- how much of this book actually is fiction? Jennette has been open about the book being inspired by her first relationship, when she was together with one of the writers of iCarly who was over thirty years old, while she was only eighteen. This makes some of the prose of the novel feel all the more pointed and raw. McCurdy is angry- she’s angry at the cards she’s been dealt and the people in her life that have taken parts of her own personal autonomy away from her. I believe her writing is a way to gain some power back in her life, to finally state her peace and I believe that to be profound.

What I have to warn the reader about Half His Age is that it is simply one of the most explicit books I’ve ever read. This is an eighteen plus read easily. McCurdy holds nothing back in this harrowing exploration of a toxic relationship. Some people have argued that the book borderlines on being pornographic at times, which I disagree with immensely. McCurdy recounts sexual experiences in the novel like someone would describe to you the way they were stuck in traffic on the way home from work. It’s cynical, it’s drab and it’s disgusting. Jennette avoids flowery language when she accounts the characters sexual experiences and is very careful about her verbage. She explains the odor, the sounds and the feeling in a way to gross out the reader. One could state the way she writes as being exploitative, especially since most of the novel Waldo is a minor. However, I believe this is being all accounted in a sense of rage. Waldo is screaming to be heard in a void that is manipulating her needs to be desired. This is a real cycle so many find themselves in - even outside the dynamic explained in this novel. While the detail is unruly, it just paints how all consuming the experience was for Waldo

If you couldn’t tell already, Half His Age won’t be for everyone, it won’t be for most people. This is an uncomfortable read. At times, the book reminded me of Greg Araki’s masterpiece Mysterious Skin, a film I have said several times is one of the best I’ve ever seen that I can recommend to no one in my life. What both this book and Mysterious Skin have in common are authors at the forefront who have compassion for the victims and accurate vitriol for the perpetrators. Waldo in the story is a bratty teenager, grappling with her own adolescent angst as we all do at around seventeen. She isn’t always likable and I spent large parts of the novel wanting to be present in the story and to tell her to stop. You can feel McCurdy doing the same in her writing. Since the perspective of the story is through the eyes of Waldo, we feel what she feels in every moment and it feels vulnerable. As Waldo finally starts to feel seen in the story, the reader does as well. This is why I think the book will be a hard read for a lot of people. They don’t want to acknowledge the ways in which this personal story can reflect back onto their own. But isn’t that the direct purpose of storytelling in general? Isn’t the first step to stop grooming to happen to directly express how deep rooted it is?

Half His Age is the most authentic representation of codependency and anxious attachment I’ve ever read. Waldo’s constant yearning and stress, wanting to appeal to Mr. Korgi- a balding forty year old loser is nothing short of devastating. It feels so palpable. The waiting for that next text. That pacing in the room, rehearsing speeches you will say to the person you’ve imagined in your head for the last few hours. McCurdy understands that aspect of the human condition so well. At times, I felt myself laughing- reminiscing on a time where I felt those very acute and disarming floods of emotion for someone I loved. That moment of brevity is then replaced with a deep rooted sadness and empathy for Waldo and to the same effect McCurdy herself. These first moments of figuring out you love someone so much it hurts is all predicated on a false narrative. It’s all predicated on some loser needing his own needs met. There’s a scene in the book, in a brief moment of clarity Mr. Korgi explains to Waldo that he’s taking something away from her. That he is hurting her and these feelings she has for him can never be replicated. He is tarnishing aspects of her own personal autonomy she can never get back. He understands this, he sees it for what it is and still pursues her to fulfill his own desire. What should be feelings of foundational firsts have turned into trauma.

Mr. Korgi is a man who should have gone to therapy years ago. A man lost in wanting to be something and amounting to nothing. He is an English teacher, but so obviously wanted to be an artist. He describes classic literature and foreign films to Waldo she doesn’t particularly care about. Early on, he pushes his own dreams onto Waldo. He explains that she is a talented writer and she needs to pursue her passions. Waldo isn’t passionate about writing she doesn’t have any aspirations for her life. She is simply just trying to survive and the book is a dissection of Mr. Korgi wanting to paint Waldo in his own muse. Not only as his partner but as the person he once aspired to be. It’s a horrific thing to see first hand - how these two people are so incredibly lost in their own skin, not having a clue how to navigate in the real world. Mr. Korgi decides to latch onto Waldo as his own personal pet project, he never sees her as a person but only as an idea.

Waldo imagines Mr. Korgi as someone he ends up not seeing. Once the rush of a secret affair becomes a norm, that feeling of adrenaline dries up. The rush is the drug, when the person is the only thing left after that rush is gone- there’s nothing to come back to but disappointment and regret.

The book ends abruptly, another thing that I can see frustrating readers. I however, found it to be a thoughtful ending to the story. It’s not the ending for Waldo, but, that story is still continuing to be told. McCurdy in the book states one thesis very clearly, people in life will disappoint you- but you cannot let the bad things that happen in your life become your personality trait. Coming of age starts as the exploration of who you are after the heartbreak and disappointment. The stories we tell back to ourselves will make us angry and spiteful, but they are foundational stories - for better or for worse.

It’s that time of the year again. I’m going to discuss all of my choices for nominations for this years Academy Awards, which will be announced tomorrow morning. I will have more to say about some of the above the line nominations, but will list out my below the line choices as well. This is going to be a long post- so let’s get started!

Live Action Short

1. Beyond Silence

2. The Boy with White Skin

3. Two People Exchanging Saliva

4. Rock, Paper, Scissors

5. The Singers

Animated Short Film

1. Snow Bear

2. Eiru

3. Butterfly

4. Playing God

5. The Girl Who Cried Pearls

Best Documentary Short

1. All the Empty Rooms

2. The Devil Is Busy

3. Perfectly a Strangeness

4. Armed Only with a Camera: The Life and Death of Brent Renaud

5. Rovina’s Choice

Original Song

1. Golden: Kpop Demon Hunters

2. I Lied to You: Sinners

3. The Girl in the Bubble: Wicked for Good

4. Dear Me: Diane Warren Relentless

5. Train Dreams: Train Dreams

Best Score

A side note- Marty Supreme is my favorite film score of the last ten years, if it gets snubbed you will hear my screams.

1. Sinners: Ludwig Goransson

2. One Battle After Another: Jonny Greenwood

3. Frankenstein: Alexandre Desplat

4. Hamnet: Max Richter

5. Marty Supreme: Daniel Lopatin

Best Sound

1. Sinners

2. F1

3. One Battle After Another

4. Frankenstein

5. Wicked for Good

Best Visual Effects

1. Avatar Fire and Ash

2. F1

3. The Lost Bus

4. Wicked for Good

5. Superman

Makeup and Hairstyling

1. Frankenstein

2. Wicked for Good

3. Sinners

4. The Smashing Machine

5. Nuremberg

Costume Design

1. Wicked for Good

2. Frankenstein

3. Hamnet

4. Sinners

5. Marty Supreme

Production Design

1. Frankenstein

2. Sinners

3. Hamnet

4. Marty Supreme

5. Wicked for Good

Best Editing

Going on a long shot here and predicting Sentimental Value over Hamnet, I might be totally wrong but Sentimental Value is masterfully edited and deserves the nomination and win in all honesty.

1. One Battle After Another

2. Sinners

3. Marty Supreme

4. F1

5. Sentimental Value

Cinematography

1. Sinners

2. Frankenstein

3. One Battle After Another

4. Train Dreams

5. Marty Supreme

Animated Feature

1. Kpop Demon Hunters

2. Zootopia 2

3. Little Amelie or the Character of Rain

4. Arco

5. Elio

Documentary Feature

1. The Perfect Neighbor

2. 2000 Meters to Andriivka

3. Cover-Up

4. The Alabama Solution

5. Mr. Nobody Against Putin

International Feature

1. Sentimental Value

2. The Secret Agent

3. It Was Just An Accident

4. Sirat

5. No Other Choice

Casting

This is a new category, so I’m not sure what to do entirely or even how much of a precursor it is for strong contenders for best picture. I took a swing here and put Weapons as my number five because I believe the casting there was essential to making the film work, especially since they had to recast due to the acting strikes last year.

1. Sinners

2. One Battle After Another

3. Marty Supreme

4. Hamnet

5. Weapons

Adapted Screenplay

I’ve been mulling over this one and I think I’m going to go with the safe five. That being said, I believe Frankenstein and Train Dreams are vulnerable for No Other Choice but since that film has been doing really poorly this season I cannot put my eggs in that basket, I hope it does happen though! I would easily take four out of five if it meant nominating one of the best screenplays of last year.

1. One Battle After Another

2. Hamnet

3. Bugonia

4. Frankenstein

5. Train Dreams

Original Screenplay

Most of these are a slam dunk, but I’m predicting and hoping for a last minute search for debut filmmaker Eva Victor’s film Sorry Baby. A movie I recently rewacthed and really loved, I should have brought it up in my best of the year post but oh well. Here’s hoping to redemption for that wonderful film.

1. Sinners

2. Marty Supreme

3. Sentimental Value

4. It Was Just An Accident

5. Sorry, Baby

Supporting Actor

This category is so locked at this point, I would be dumbfounded if anything else made it’s way in. Only thing I could consider is Andrew Scott in Blue Moon and if that happened, expect Blue Moon to show up in best picture.

1. Stellan Skarsgard: Sentimental Value

2. Benicio del Toro: One Battle After Another

3. Sean Penn: One Battle After Another

4. Jacob Elordi: Frankenstein

5. Paul Mescal: Hamnet

Supporting Actress

There’s more nuance in this category. For one, Ariana Grande could still sneakily make her way into this category after being a front runner last season for the same role. With all of the momentum Wicked for Good has lost however, it seems like betting on a loosing horse. There is also the potential of Elle Fanning for Sentimental Value or Gwyneth Paltrow for Marty Supreme to get in. That being said, contemporaries for both said movies have been getting more attention awards season. Could we see a Helen Mirren in Belfast situation where she gets in over the supporting performance of a lesser known actress? It’s not impossible, but not something I’m going to personally predict.

1. Teyana Taylor: One Battle After Another

2. Amy Madigan: Weapons

3. Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas: Sentimental Value

4. Wunmi Mosaku: Sinners

5. Odessa A’zion: Marty Supreme

Actor

This category has six strong contenders and you have to cut one of them to make a five. Sadly, the common cut is Jesse Plemmons, who should easily be getting nominated for his terrific work in Bugonia. While he has been doing well this entire season, his contemporaries have more wins under their belt than he does. However, I wouldn’t be totally shocked if he made it in.

1. Timothee Chalamet: Marty Supreme

2. Leonardo DiCaprio: One Battle After Another

3. Ethan Hawke: Blue Moon

4. Michael B. Jordan: Sinners

5. Wagner Moura: The Secret Agent

Actress

Another category that seems pretty self explanatory. I am afraid of a sneak nomination by Kate Hudson in Song Sung Blue, a movie I quite frankly loathed but has been a big commercial hit this holiday season. I think sadly she would get in over Chase Infiniti which would be a devastating snub. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.

1. Jessie Buckley: Hamnet

2. Renate Reinsve: Sentimental Value

3. Rose Byrne: If I Had Legs I’d Kick You

4. Emma Stone: Bugonia

5. Chase Infiniti: One Battle After Another

Director

The most contested category this season. There’s so many strong options to vote for in this category. I’ve had Jafar Panahi getting in all season long for his excellent film It Was Just An Accident, but that films underperformance this year has made it hard to consider over some heavier hitters. The directors branch does like to throw its bones at international directors, especially Cannes winners like It Was Just An Accident, but, with Sentimental Value here I believe they have that corner filled. It’s hard to contend with what is going to miss, but probably something huge. I’m gonna play my cards safe here and hope for the best.

1. Paul Thomas Anderson: One Battle After Another

2. Ryan Coogler: Sinners

3. Josh Safdie: Marty Supreme

4. Chloe Zhao: Hamnet

5. Joachim Trier: Sentimental Value

Best Picture

This category this year is tough. I have a few things that could happen. Neon getting three movies in and two of them being nine and ten slots is possible, but doesn’t seem that realistic to me. I have a feeling it might not pan out. So then I look at other options. My top seven I believe are best picture locks at this point- so what are eight nine and ten? I believe Train Dreams is the most solid number eight but is more vulnerable than a lot of people believe it is. Then I think you might have to pick a Neon film and a PGA film for the final two slots. The Secret Agent has the most momentum right now with it’s Golden Globe wins. I think that is what will get it the ninth slot. I am going on a whim here and I think Weapons will be the tenth slot. I believe if the film can secure casting and supporting actress nomination from Amy Madigan (and maybe even surprise in screenplay) it could gain enough last minute momentum to secure a tenth slot. That being said, It Was Just An Accident is a strong contender and an important movie. It won the Palme D’or at Cannes and last year best picture winner Anora won that coveted award. Despite it’s lackluster season it could secure that final spot. F1 is also competitive in several tech categories and secured a PGA nomination, which makes it a contender for that final slot. Maybe the Academy simply goes for the blockbuster crowd pleaser and when we all thought the one blockbuster to get in outside Sinners would be Avatar or Wicked, it was F1 the whole time. Sony Pictures Classics is also known to pull some surprises with their nominations and Blue Moon could be it. With Ethan Hawke being competitive in actor and the film potentially surprising in screenplay, you never know what it could pull off. For now, these are my nominations for best picture, taking a swing we will see what happens.

1. One Battle After Another

2. Sinners

3. Marty Supreme

4. Hamnet

5. Frankenstein

6. Sentimental Value

7. Bugonia

8. Train Dreams

9. The Secret Agent

10. Weapons

That’s what I have for you today! Let’s see how wrong I am about this categories tomorrow!

Hello! It’s been a while, I hope everyone is well in this crazy world.

For a while I was making a weekly recap series on this page, where I talked about everything I watched and listened to over the week and in all honesty, I got burnt out pretty fast on that. I might bring it back as a monthly series instead- but going forward I do want to use this platform as a sort of blog to be able to discuss my relationship to media at large. I think the review format leaves me feeling stilted when I do not have a strong opinion on a certain film. For instance, I found it kind of nice walking out of Anaconda recently and knowing I didn’t have to write a critique on a perfectly inoffensive silly movie. What’s the point? At least for me to do that in this point in my life where my final goal is to be making art not necessarily critiquing it.

That being said, I look back at previous posts I’ve made here about films like Eddington, One Battle After Another and Superman- movies I adore that I will be discussing here today on this post and I’m proud of them because there’s substance in those reviews. So for now on, I’m using this platform for when I have a long winded analysis on something- not just film anything at all. I think if I focus my energy on this then I will have more of a drive to write here - and not feel like an obligation.

Regardless, something I love doing this year I also slightly stress myself out about is my favorite movies of the year. 2025 to my shock wounded up being the most important year for movies since 2019. I believe several films coming out this year will be considered classics- studied for years to come and meeting the moment culturally in profound ways.

First off lets so some set dressing before going on with the main list. Each year I like to do honorable mentions and runner ups. Honorable mentions include media that would be included in this list if it was considered a movie. I make a separate list for my favorite albums, but I don’t watch enough television to give it it’s own list. However, this year I did watch more television than in previous years. Nathan Fielder came back with The Rehearsal Season 2, a terrific season that was as poignant as it was hilarious. Seth Rogen brought us The Studio, a hilarious meta comedy about the pit falls of the Hollywood system, Severance season 2 is proof that Apple TV’s hit is shaping to be this generations Twin Peaks’, Adolescence is one of the most powerful looks at the warping social media is having on our next generation I’ve ever seen and Adult Swim’s The Elephant was an amazing artistic statement and one of the coolest passion projects I’ve seen hit the mainstream. Even despite it’s faults, Stranger Things season five ended nicely if not flawed.

However, easily my favorite television series of the year goes to Raphael Bob-Waksberg’s newest show Long Story Short. The Creator of Bojack Horseman once again proved that he could create an engaging and emotional television show. This show is a lot less emotionally devastating than Bojack Horseman, but through it’s slice of life approach shows the complicated dynamics of a Jewish family as they discover their path in life- having you reflect upon your own existence and ponder the moments that mean something to you. It’s a really funny show, it’s a very sweet show and winds up being challenging in the same way Bojack Horseman was. It’s one of the best things I watched this year easily.

Now let’s get into the runner ups. These are films that I considered placing on my favorites of the year that couldn’t quite make it, since I cap off my list at ten. Paddington in Peru, while not as good as Paddington 2 (what is) was still a delightful wrap up to a trilogy that means a lot to me, Zootopia 2 was a pleasant surprise, a great follow up and progression of the first film, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You was a crazy and anxiety inducing experience featuring one of the best performances I’ve ever seen from Rose Byrne, Roofman was one of the most charming movies of the year that was a great representation of the church as a positive role model, Boys Go to Jupiter was a unique directorial debut micro budgeted animated film that perfectly represents what it feels like to live in Florida, The Materialists was a thoughtful examination of relationships and another incredible screenplay from Celine Song, Mickey 17 was a goofy, irreverent and poignant return from the master himself Bong Joon-Ho that features one of the best performances in Robert Pattison’s career, Frankenstein was a terrific outing for Guillermo Del Toro- finally making his monster movie opus and How to Train Your Dragon was a great live action adaptation I believe did the original justice. Seeing it in Imax opening night as a huge fan of the entire franchise was one of the best movie going experiences of the year, however since it is just a shot for shot remake of one of my favorite movies of all time, I almost felt it was unfair to include it on the list.

My number eleven spot would go to Rian Johnson’s excellent Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery. I love the first Knives Out film but was underwhelmed by Glass Onion, I believe Wake Up Dead Man is a return to greatness. This film’s biggest strength is its social commentary on the church’s role in a community, and how it can either help heal and transform or be a force of destruction- making people feel even more alienated and alone. As a murder mystery itself, this is probably the most predictable one of the three and I believe having it have to be structured like a Knives Out mystery does hinder some of the stronger themes that could be delved into even more. With that being said, now with two viewings of the film I can confirm I think it’s really excellent.

Now onto the top ten!

10. Friendship (dir. Andrew DeYoung)

I had to be honest with myself with this pick. Other movies in this list I will say I believe were exceptional and even changed the form when it comes to film in the future. Friendship is just a hilarious movie. I do think Andrew DeYoung does a good job framing the film with directorial flair, making this film feel and operate at some points like a thriller as we see a man descent into his own madness, just because he cannot hang out with other men. In some ways, there is a deep sadness in the forefront of this movie of individuals who simply cannot connect with other human beings. However, this never once compromises this movies humor. I know people who hate this movie because they find it super uncomfortable and I understand this. If the Nathan Fielder, John Wilson and Tim Robinson brand of observational comedy is not for you this will be a tough watch. This is my list however, and I haven’t laughed harder at a movie than this one in years. Simply couldn’t catch my breath in some scenes. I had a great time.

9. Bugonia (dir. Yorgos Lanthimos)

I am normally a Yorgos Lanthimos agnostic. I know he has been set up as being our next Stanley Kubrick in the eyes of several film enthusiasts, but I’ve always had trouble grasping onto the humanity he subscribes to through the deprived nature of his films. Even his most acclaimed film Poor Things is a movie I loved at first but it started to sour on me the more I thought about what it was saying on a broader level. Lathimos teaming up with Will Tracy, who wrote The Menu, a movie I wasn’t a fan of to put it lightly had me hesitant going in. However, when this movie started I knew I was in for a treat. Bugonia plays like a two hour extended episode of the craziest Adult Swim bumper you’ve ever seen. With its bonkers concept of conspiracy theorists kidnapping this CEO they believe to be an alien, it’s Lanthimos’ most stripped down film to date. A lot of the film delves in really thought provoking conversations that keep you on the edge of your seat the entire time. Its visceral violence only happens in spurts, making the film feel all the more invigorating when it needs to be. I also believe the ending is really profound and while some might say Yorgos is once again delving into nihilism here- I believe what he has to say about humanity as a whole is a little more complicated than that.

8. Weapons (dir. Zach Creggor)

I love a good August sleeper and Weapons certainly was that this year. The film, about a bunch of kids who disappear during the night is one of the most entertaining films I saw last year. First off, I knew this film would be for me because I love stories about how people respond to tragedy and what they are doing before and after tragedy so much more than portraying the tragedy itself. Weapons, through it’s invigorating storytelling device, is able to show how an event like this can effect the lives of so many people- directly and indirectly. While it becomes a full fledged horror movie, and a good one, in the last act before then it shows the horror and tragedy of the not knowing so well. It’s an excellent screenplay and the movie I’ve rewatched the most this year.

7. No Other Choice (dir. Park Chan-wook)

Another sub genre of films I love are movies that explore the horrors and complexities of the workforce and no movie does that better than the newest Park Chan-wook epic No Other Choice. The film divulges into one central question “what lengths would you go to for your family and to keep a roof over their heads, for them to live a good life and how far would you go to peruse the work you are passionate about?”, for anyone that’s ever been screwed over by a work system, the feeling of pent up frustration and hopelessness is so palpable here. Lee Byung-hun is excellent in the film, channeling a lot of the emotional catharsis needed in the role of a man at the end of his rope. The film ends up having the pacing and humor of a Saturday morning cartoon, however it never feels tonally off balanced. It feels like the fantastical escapism, but also a tragic tale about what you have to loose in the process of finding success (a common theme in movies this year).

6. Eddington (dir. Ari Aster)

Eddington is interesting, because the film came out to very mixed reactions coming out of Cannes and continued that reputation when it hit theatres and essentially bombed. As the year went on and unfortunate things continued to happen in our country, this films analysis on American culture has aged like fine wine. Eddington does a daring thing and shows us the perspective of the anti-mask sheriff of the town. People at the time wondered if this was Aster sympathizing with conservatives, which is think is the most dense analysis you could have on this movie. The movie does portray the empty activism of the Left as something problematic, but it never states that the Right’s solution to the pandemic was the right one. The sheriff in the film might believe he is a martyr but he is not. It shows that the lengths he takes to stand up for something false forces him to sacrifice everything, including aspects of his own autonomy. This movie works as a terrific satire, a gritty western and a solid unflinching look at what 2020 felt like that no one else has been able to capture this profoundly. Ari Aster is four out of four for me still.

5. Sinners (dir. Ryan Coogler)

Sinners was the success story of the year, no matter how you look at it, this is the film of the year. The one we will look back as the juggernaut. Not only for award season, which it is a major contender for several categories, but the box office as well. The film, which was an original horror film from Ryan Coogler that came out in April ended up making 280 million dollars domestically. This is more than either Fantastic Four or Thunderbolts made for Disney this year. Sinners will go down as a modern day classic and it is a film that continued to grow on me the further we got into the year. I love the way it plays with genre conventions, I love the way it presents a supernatural tale of vampires seamlessly into a powerful narrative about gentrification and I love that it’s a celebration of the power of music and art in general. It feels like the movie Ryan Coogler was born to make.

4. Superman (dir. James Gunn)

I’ve debated where to place the next few movies and overtime they could probably shift around but where I’m sitting at now- Superman was my film event of the year. This was my most anticipated movie of 2026, being a big fan of the character since watching Smallville as a kid and loving the All Star Superman run of the comics. I’m not a Henry Cavil hater in the slightest, but I never attached to him as my definitive Superman. This is to me my Superman movie. This is my favorite of adaptation of the character yet (with all due respect to the legendary Christopher Reeve). David Cornswet captured to me the true essence of this character and the light he can put into this world, especially in this divided era. This is another movie that meets the world at it’s moments, as the international conflict Superman is interfering with can easily be analogized as the Israel and Palestine conflict. The best scene in the movie is a long twelve minute conversation about the ethics of Superman in the city and how his presence as a being as powerful as a nuclear bomb is a threat no matter what way you look at it. These scenes are carried masterfully not only by Cornswet but Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane who is the perfect foil to Clark Kents glossy and optimistic but somewhat narrow view of foreign affairs. This is in my opinion, one of the best superhero movies of all time and a film that has a lot more on its mind than it’s being credited for at this point of the year. It is in many ways the Paddington 2 of superhero movies and is a movie I’ll cherish.

3. One Battle After Another (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson)

One Battle After Another is projected to be our next best picture winner at The Oscars and if that’s the case, it would be one of the coolest wins of all time. Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest is the director at top form, giving us a politically charged action movie that is one of the fastest three hour movies I’ve ever seen. This movie is perfectly paced, it’s hilarious, buzzing with so much life and it’s a profound statement on revolutionaries. PTA isn’t painting a perfect picture of leftists, showing how people can be compromised due to their own emotional baggage, but is showing us that the continued fight against authoritarian regime is an important one. This is also a film that’s central thesis is powerful - maybe it’s time for the next generation to atone for the sins of the past ones and pave a better future for us all. This is of course, while blaring Tom Petty’s American Girl. This is another film that will go down in the history books as one of the most important movies made in this decade and it’s a wildly entertaining one as well.

2. Sentimental Value (dir. Joachim Trier)

This is a movie that has only grown on me since I saw it about a month ago. This is Joachim Trier’s follow up to his acclaimed 2021 film The Worst Person in the World, a movie I liked okay but admittedly need to watch again. This movie caught my attention with its concept, about a filmmaker casting his estranged daughter to be in his film after abandoning her was so tragic. The film has a lot to say about the role film and art plays into our lives and how both can intertwine in ways we don’t expect. I do believe no matter how far someone runs away from their own inner demons, the art they make and latch onto is a reflection of something deep inside of them - a lot of things unresolved. Sentimental Value takes a unique approach to this concept and actually shows the vapidness of this ideology. Sure, it feels romantic to make a sweeping gesture and to atone to your past mistakes to cast your family in your project, but how much is that projecting? Artists risk so much, they sacrifice a lot in pursuit of a dream but is that dream even noble if you sacrifice the actual relationships in your life? This film makes the declarative statement, no. Make time for the real world and the reflections of a lived life will reflect off the art you make. Sentimental Value is a noble movie and a much needed reminder of how a glamorous lifestyle is vapid if there’s no one to share it with.

1. Marty Supreme (dir. Josh Safdie)

What a picture. I think the biggest character development for me is making Marty Supreme my favorite movie of the year after becoming somewhat viral on Letterboxd for my scathing review of the last Safdie Brothers movie Uncut Gems. While I still don’t love that movie, looking back I do find the value in it- my taste has broadened a lot since 2019. What I do lack in Uncut Gems outside of its visual appeal is a lack of interest in the subject matter or the main character. Who knew it would take ping pong to make me emotionally invested in a Safdie Brothers movie but here we are. This film is only directed by one of the Safdie’s, Josh Safdie after his brother Ben went off to direct The Smashing Machine with middling results, but this feels like the movie the duo was supposed to make their entire career. Marty Supreme is the most fun I had watching a movie all year. I was cackling throughout, it also had moments of complete shock and awe for me. I see so many movies in a year- it’s hard to surprise me anymore and this movie went in directions I was not anticipating at all. Timothee Chalamet gives the performance of the decade so far portraying Marty Mauser, a man in pursuit of the American Dream, not wanting to be confined to be just one thing. Marty in the movie is a self proclaimed narcissist, paving the life he believes he deserves, screwing anyone over in the process. This character is hard to root for, he is a bad person and the personification of toxic masculinity presented on the big screen. The miracle of the movie is that it has you sympathize with Marty, someone who would be insufferable to meet in real life. I believe the movies central thesis in the pursuit of greatness is a recognizable and identifiable one to anyone who has ever had a dream. This movie is the nightmarish horror version of that pursuit. It’s a cautionary tale on how grind culture and the hyper fixations of proving your self worth can have you compromising everything else that is important. In that way, it’s the harsher and much more aggressive take on the themes of Sentimental Value. When choosing a favorite movie of the year- I think of a lot of factors but the biggest one is a film that reaches out to me in the time I need it. Movies like last years I Saw the TV Glow, having me confront my own attachment to media and how it had shaped me or The Fabelmans, a movie directly about wanting to make movies to reflect your own inner emotions you haven’t entirely compartmentalized yet. For Marty Supreme, it was to pull back and examine what is truly important. Sometimes, in pursuit of your passions it’s easy to have a narrow lens of the world around you. The final shot of this movie is so poignant and had me shattered sitting in the theatres as the credits rolled, contemplating my own path and the things I hadn’t considered before. It’s an uncompromising ending, one that could be interpreted in so many ways that I dare not spoil. Along with an engaging story comes one of the best scores to any movie I’ve ever seen. The new age Epcot sound of this movie was unexpected and a pleasant surprise. I’m obsessed with the themes of this movie, I’m obsessed with the way it looks and sounds. I’ve never seen anything quite like it, it’s a singular film that will go down as an all time favorite and a movie I think will be discussed for years to come.

That are my ten favorite movies of the year! Comment your favorites below and I’ll talk to you all in the next post!

Movies

- Poltergeist

“They’re hereee”

I hadn’t seen Poltergeist in years but remember being shocked by how scary it was for a PG movie when I watched it (which this was one of the early movies that helped create the PG-13 label, but I digress). There’s still a lot of horror movies to this day that take a lot of their hallmarks from this film and you can see why. This is just a fun time at the movies. There’s nothing truly innovative about the film, it’s just really good at what it does which is give you some fun scares and some good laughs at the absurdity of it all. Steven Spielberg and Tobe Hooper came together to make a great film to ease young horror fans into the genre.

- True Grit

I’ve been meaning to watch this one for years so I’m glad I finally got around to checking out True Grit. I knew once the Blank Check podcast had Starvos on as a guest to talk about the film I had to watch it - and this movie has not been overhyped! It’s really fun and the type of film only the Coens would be able to adapt in their own special way. I love the irreverent sense of humor the film has, all while telling a story that tackles deep understanding of grief, revenge and remorse. The final line of the film is one that will stay with me for a long time. Hailee Steinfeld in this film gives quite possibly the greatest child performance of all time, she’s unbelievable in this one.

- Predator: Badlands

I was excited to see what Youtube critic turned filmmaker Dan Trachtenberg would do with a 100 million dollar budget and a big property like Predator and after the likes of Prey and Predator Killer of Killers I think it’s cool one of these projects finally gets a big screen release. I’m a little conflicted about this movie, because I really like the direction they took with this franchise. I think it’s pretty bold to have our protagonist be one of the Yautja themselves, yet the film doesn’t play this like Maleficent where the villains have always been misunderstood. This species and their calling are evil, this one we follow just goes on a journey to discover what he has been taught his entire life has been wrong. This journey through the lens of one of the best looking blockbusters I’ve seen in recent memory with beautiful world building and immaculate creatures had me in awe. That’s why I wish narratively this had done more for me. If you know the heroes journey arc, you’ll know exactly how this film plays out after the first ten to fifteen minutes. I was just waiting for it to narratively do something new and it doesn’t. Overall, it’s a fun blockbuster spectacle but it could have been even more than that with another retooling of this very basic arc.

- Matilda

I had never seen Matilda until this week, which is kinda shocking because of my love for off kilter adaptations of children’s literature, but this one always just passed me by. Overall, while a little uneven I did really enjoy the film. I think this is an important movie for kids to see and could be a cathartic look at how you will one day find the peace and solidarity you seek for even when it feels like the world is against you, one day you won’t have to use your powers.

- Nashville

This movie is an all time favorite for me. This almost three hour sprawling hangout film from hometown filmmaking legend Robert Altman is one that feels so cozy every time I watch it. The gospel and country sensibilities are so in tune of my own coming of age (and Altman himself is from Missouri so he definitely has the sensibilities of someone who grew up in the Midwest, capturing so many personalities of people I grew up around) even if I didn’t grow up in Nashville itself, this movie still has so much Branson Missouri attached to it. This is weirdly a comfort movie for me- but that last thirty minutes is so devastating. I love that Altman doesn’t tell us why or how, just that one day we can be living the American dream and it can come to a halt because of the radicalization of culture. This movie is both of the moment and forty years ahead of its time, because it is able to capture so much of the human experience in just a little under three hours.

- La Haine

La Haine for the last few years has gained a massive cult following of people claiming it’s one of the best films ever made so I finally decided to check it out and honestly, I don’t see it. Hot take, but I didn’t love this movie. I think there’s a lot of admiration I have for it. The passage of time is well captured here, the mis en scene is gorgeous. The settings feel very lived in and the film is very well framed. The cinematography is gorgeous. I just think this concept would be so much powerful if the three men in this film were more interesting than they are. These guys to me felt like archetypes and their conversations throughout the movie were not interesting to me at all. I also don’t love the edit of this film, I found some of the choices here to be odd and while I admire the ambitions of trying something different, I think in execution the way this film is edited and paced too me out of the realism the film was trying to present. I know, it’s a scolding hot take and maybe it’ll be one I cringe looking back on in a few years but I have to be honest.

Television

Smiling Friends and The Chair Company continue to still delight. I have nothing else to report this week. I will be catching up with Pluribus, the new Vince Gilligan show sometime this week!

Music

- Liquorice: Hatchie

Only listened to one album in full this week, but Hatchie’s Liquorice is one of the years best albums. This dream pop album harkens to the likes of bands like The Sundays and The Cranberries, it feels like it could score your own coming of age fantasy. Hatchie’s album feels whimsical when it needs to and sludgy when it needs to, it perfectly captures the angst of growing up and the shining hope of a better future as well. Beautiful synths and amazing shoegazy guitar tones throughout. I’ve thought this year for film has been lackluster (which in all honesty I think can be seen through the awful Grammy nominations this year) so I’m glad this album came out when it did!

Culture

If you are someone who just wants America to stop being a clown show run by the worst people you know, this week was a breath of fresh air. Some hope came out of the recent elections, where Zohran Mamdani won the vote for New York mayor and every state had major wins for the Democratic Party. This was one of the first times in recent we’ve finally seen the American people say “STOP” to the MAGAfication of the country and the right wing shills are seething over it. Lies about the candidates are being spread as MAGA is finally starting to realize their empire is imploding. Soon, we will see a lot of these spineless shills start to backtrack on what they have been saying for years, disparaging minorities rights and supporting genocide. That is why we must not forget names like Ben Shapiro, Dave Rubin, Julian Michaels and Megan Kelly for continuing to be the worst and propagating for ideas that would make the lives of the working class worse so they can continue to milk their own greed through capitalistic structures they have built and continue to exploit. Megan Kelly has the absolute GALL to say on her show that “not a single working class person in New York voted for Mamdami”. I have news for you Megan, as someone who knows several people who are in the working class in New York, you couldn’t be more wrong. Continue to spread lies until everyone sees through your grift!

For our, “hey this person isn’t too bad” award for the week, we have to shout out Curtis Sliwa. He seems like a nice dude who actually wants to see the best in the working class of New York and had the backbone to wish Mamdani good luck because he doesn’t just care about his own self interest, but he cares about the people. Most Republicans now hope to see New York burn down, because that would support their own agenda against Mamdani’s politics. Sliwa however, one of the last true “Republicans” actually wants to see things get better for the working class, even if that is through policies he doesn’t align with. This is admirable and while I don’t agree with his politics and think his interviews have been incredibly goofy, I overall think Sliwa is a respectable guy in the same way John McCain or Mitt Romney were.

Another thing we are seeing in real time is a right wing civil war and it’s glorious to see. Ben Shapiro and Tucker Carlson are on an all out war as Shapiro claims Tucker is propositioning the alt right anti semetic rhetorics of commentators like self proclaimed neo nazi Nick Fuentes while Tucker Carlson shoots back that Ben is a shill to the Israel Government and is being bought out by them to push out his own agenda. Republican commentator Candace Owens even entered the picture, defending Tucker Carlson and landing the bombshell that Ben Shapiro is not liked in the conservative movement, and the late Charlie Kirk even believed Shapiro was a toxic figure. This revelation has came after weeks of Shapiro claiming his deep admiration and friendship with Kirk and practically begging Turning Points to let him be apart of their organization. The funny thing about this whole debate is that every single person involved is in the wrong. Tucker shouldn’t be interviewing and propositioning Fuentes on his show, he is a corrupt figure. Shapiro is not an honest actor. This entire controversy being played out feels like watching two trash bags fight each other in the wind and it’s glorious.

I guess I would be dismissed if I didn’t bring up that The Grammy nominations happened this week, since I brought them up earlier. Last year, The Grammy’s actually nominated some truly great and boundary pushing records for pop music (and then gave song of the year to the diss track Not Like Us by Kendrick Lamar which is barely even a song- but I digress) the line up last year gave me hope in the future of this awards body. Then, this line up came out, which is quite possibly the worst line up of albums I’ve ever seen nominated for album of the year. I believe this organization is no longer concerned at all for nominating the best of the year, just the ones that will give them the most ratings on their broadcast. It’s been a weak year for music anyways, but where are the actual albums being acclaimed by music critics? Where is Geese? Magdalena Bay? Quadeca? The artists that aren’t as popular as Taylor Swift per say but are actually pushing the art form forward in profound ways? I don’t get it. It’s like if The Oscar’s nominated movies like Jurassic World Rebirth for best picture because they made a ton of money over the summer and Johnathan Bailey is a superstar now. I don’t know, the legitimacy of this awards body is none- and we’ve all known this ever since The Weeknd controversy at The Grammy’s years ago. Look into that story if you would like, but that made it transparent that this origination is bought out and paid unlike any other. My choice for album of the year would easily be Chromokopia by Tyler the Creator who is easily one of the best R & B artists working today. I also thought Man’s Best Friend by Sabrina Carpenter was a really fun album that had some standout tracks on it. Overall, those are the only two albums I like on the list. It’s rough, here’s to hoping for a better line up next year.

That’s all I got! See you guys next week!

Hello! I’m deciding to do something new on this page, and do a weekly update on the movies I watch, music I listen to and my thoughts on culture at large for the past week. I hope you enjoy reading and take something away from it!

Film

These are the movies I watched this week!

- Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere

This film is the newest musical biopic film about the one and only, Bruce Springsteen. Several of these films have been coming out the last few years and gained acclaimed, especially for their central performances. Last year’s A Complete Unknown, chronicling a passage of time in the life of folk hero Bob Dylan ended up to get nominated for a ton of Oscars, including Timothee Chalamet for best actor. Will Springsteen have the same luck? I doubt it. This film falls somewhere in between A Complete Unknown (a movie I really liked) and Bohemian Rhapsody (a movie I kinda hated). This movie is solid, but lacks any sort of dramatic urgency. I liked the framing around the film- this movie is not a cradle to tomb biopic like Bohemian Rhapsody or Baz Luhrman’s Elvis. This film centers around the inception of the album Nebraska and the context of why that album is as depressing as it is. It can’t help but escape some of the trappings that plague these biopics, the cliches that come along with watching the musical process happen onscreen. When the film is about Springsteen making the album, it adds little to no context than what you could find on a Wikipedia article. However, the relationship arc between him and a girl he meets and develops a relationship with is really powerful stuff and I wish the film had explored that tragic dynamic more. It’s a handsomely made film, but a little too mundane to make much of an impact this season. Jeremy Allen White does a good job portraying Bruce but I believe performances in the past in these bio pics do a little more and are given a little more than White is given here. This is a perfectly delightful Sunday afternoon watch but there’s not much more substance to it outside of that.

- Over the Garden Wall

I watch this every year and some how I feel like I’m rediscovering it every time I watch it. It’s magic- the beautiful soothing music, the creative and lustrous animation, the perfect ten minute episodes that are cohesively brilliant. Wirt and Greg being two of the most relatable characters in animation, I love it all so much. It’s a coming of age story about never loosing that childhood innocence and curiosity, but it’s also okay to be introspective, taking control of your life starts with deciding to be okay with the person you see in the mirror- even if that person is wearing a pot on their head.

- Frankenstein

Guillermo Del Toro’s Frankenstein is a triumph. The film has gotten a mixed to positive reception in the film festival circuit, but has been embraced by audiences alike. When it won second place at Tiff’s People’s Choice this year, I knew people would end up responding to this film in a big way and they have. For me, I really do enjoy it. I’m a big fan of Del Toro, and I will always prefer his original films he’s made like Pan’s Labyrinth and The Shape of Water- but as far as an adaptation of Mary Shelley, you cannot do much better than this film. I think the first half takes a bit to get going and the pacing feels slightly off, but once this film finds it’s footing it becomes electric (no pun intended). This film is about the pathos of the monster and how he is a victim of forced autonomy and I found that aspect of the film to be very poignant. Jacob Elordi gives in my opinion the best supporting performance of the year as the monster who we see grow up and adapt to his world and learn what ethics and values are on screen. It’s a beautiful tale about how we can grow and adapt and not be weighed down by what we were programmed to be. In a way, this film feels like a predecessor in some ways to Brad Bird’s masterpiece The Iron Giant. Sequences of this film reminded me of the transcendent beauty of some of David Lowery’s best films like A Ghost Story and The Green Knight. In conclusion, despite some of the odd choices made here, I think this is the best film Del Toro has made since his Oscar winning The Shape of Water, and one you have to seek out in theatres if you can.

- ParaNorman

I was pretty excited when I heard ParaNorman was coming back to theatres. I’ve loved seeing Coraline in theatres again and I think the people at Laika are wizard and will always support stop motion animation. I hadn’t seen this movie in years, but have always enjoyed it but I forgot how emotional this movie actually was. I was moved to tears by the end of it, when the climax of the film was a character having to choose forgiveness for a group of people who didn’t deserve it. I wasn’t expecting to feel spiritually moved in Paranorman, but there I was reassessing the way I saw forgiveness from some of the people in my life that had done me wrong as well. Norman is such a great protagonist, one who never feels burdened by his gifts but just has to live with being misunderstood by a town of people that are under a mob effect- believing things can only be one way. The animation in this film is stunning and the music is exceptional as well, Jon Brion is one of my favorite composers and this is one of his most underrated scores to date. Overall, this film is massively underrated and one I’m sure I’ll revisit again and again.

- Bugonia

What an amazing film. Bugonia is such a fun ride, a cat and mouse chase. This film is about a conspiracy theorist played by Jesse Plemons who convinces his cousin to help him kidnap a CEO played by Emma Stone that he perceives to be an alien. This film has such a great sense of setting. This rural small town asethetic feels other worldy because of the way it is framed and shot, juxtaposing that with a bombastic score that is reminiscent of some of the best Hitchcock film scores. While the film is intimate in scope, the film always lets us know that the stakes for these characters feel larger than life. This movie boasts an incredible and thoughtful screenplay that is morbid, but also really engrossing and funny. This is the type of film I would love to see more of come out and it is easily one of my favorites of the year.

- If I Had Legs I’d Kick You

If I Had Legs I’d Kick You is one of the most anxiety inducing films I’ve ever seen. This film, chronicling the life of a mother trying to make ends meet with a sick child and an absent husband, is one that made me want to tear the skin off of my face- but it’s a compliment for this film. Rose Byrne gives one of the best female performances I’ve ever seen in a film and I believe she should easily be winning The Oscar this year, even over Jessie Buckley in Hamnet who I loved. The way she is able to carry this entire film is incredibly impressive and her pathos is understood so well. This film operates like a Safdie Brothers film as far as tension goes, but I found more to emotionally respond to here unlike the Safdie films which I more admire than actually enjoy. I can’t say that I would want to watch this movie over and over again, but I can find catharsis in watching someone go through the most stressful time in their life and find relatability in some of their struggles- even if I’m not a mother of a sick child. The human experience is kinda wild in that way.

Music

- The Last Dinner Party: From the Pyre

The Last Dinner Party last year released their debut album Prelude to Ecstasy, which I found to be one of the best indie pop records of the year. The hooks in that album are infectious and I could only see the band grow from that first album, so I’ve had an eye out for their Sophomore album From the Pyre. Sadly, I don’t think this album is as memorable as their debut. It’s not because the sound is now bad, this album is very well produced and sonically a lot more dynamic than their last. However, this album feels a lot more melodic, which I would appreciate and do to a certain extent, but the songs in my opinion made less of an impact than the songs on their debut album. With that being said, this is still a gorgeous album that continues to show the strength this band has and I can see them continuing to grow and make great projects in the future.

- Tame Impala: Deadbeat

What, what happened here? Tame Impala’s new album is one of the biggest misfires of the entire year. This album feels like someone messing around with a midi keyboard for the first time, with some of the most cringe inducing lyrics I’ve heard on an album since, well the newest Taylor Swift album (not a great year for music to be entirely. honest). One song includes the line “You are a cinephile and I watch Family Guy” I kid you not. After releasing Currents, one of the most forward thinking progressive pop records of the last ten years with hit after hit on it, you have to wonder what happened here and if this musical project should just retire at this point. It is just one guy after all.

TV

- Smiling Friends Season 3

Smiling Friends Season 3 continues to be awesome. This is the best project to come out from Adult Swim since Joe Pera Talks With You. This show is a burst of imagination and features some of the most off kilter and irreverent humor you can find on television right now. It’s one of those shows that will be remembered for years to come.

- The Chair Company

The newest Tim Robinson show is an absolute riot. Four episodes in and I’m just waiting to see how this all comes down to. This show will all depend on how good the pay off is because it’s just all one big joke, but it’s sure been entertaining to watch the chaos go down in the most recent episodes. Robinson is always playing the same character but I wouldn’t want it any other way.

Culture

I don’t know about you, but watching the news feels like a satirical hell scape these days- it feels like we are living in a mix of Paul Verhoeven film and a running gag on The Simpsons that won’t end. If anything- things keep getting worse in our country, especially for the poor and immigrants in our nation. ICE raids are an ugly and disgusting abuse of power- seeing fascism happen on a large scale in real time and the victims are poor innocent migrant families. Now, with the Government shut downs struggling families are loosing their Snap benefits, which could leave to some families starving this winter- it is a dark time for our Country and I pray for the victims that our horrible Government is failing. I hope vile political commentators like Dave Rubin from The Rubin Report, who from his million dollar mansion where he has interns do most of his research proclaim “no one is starving that wasn’t already” are remembered at this time for their complete lack of empathy and understanding on how our Government works. I would love if some of these right wing pundits were visited by the ghost of Christmas past, present and future but we’ve almost had ten years of the MAGA movement and it hasn’t happened yet, so I digress I have little faith.

Let’s shout out some cool people currently speaking out against power. Popular musical artist Billie Eilish accepted an Innovator Award at the Washington Street Journal this last week. In her speech, she declared that billionaires should be held accountable for their actions- stating that “the world is really bad right now and what are you doing about it?” Billie Eilish is not a billionaire and actually donated 11.5 million dollars of her tour earnings to charities around the world. With Billie Eilish advocating for better wealth distribution and Olivia Rodrigo, another famous pop star paying for her tour mates to get the proper mental health care they need while on tour- it’s nice to see the millennial becoming famous advocating for the rights of the American working class and mental health. Seeing popular figures advocate for empathy in a Government controlled by ones who have none is a way we can win back the culture and start to heal it. Apparently at the speech, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg look visually pissed off in the audience. Isn’t it nice to see tech bro billionaire bullies be put in their place in real time? For everyone complaining that Billie Eilish is still charging over a hundred dollars for a concert ticket after scolding the rich, please know that these artists normally don’t have much control on how much a concert ticket is priced. The venue has to get paid and so do all of the people like the pyrotechnics, sound operators and tour managers- it’s not just Billie collecting your cash. I’m sorry if that doesn’t feed into your narrative better though!

Also going to give a shout out to Miss Rachel, who continues to fight for better treatment for the children of Gaza and advocate for snap benefits to be reinstated. She consistently brings up how her relationship to Jesus Christ guides her decisions to me radical and bold about defending the marginalized and as someone who is also religious, it is nice to see a self proclaimed Christian not bought out by the alt right who is sticking up for what she believes in, even if she gets backlash from it from a mob or senseless right wing crusaders. We love you Miss Rachel, you truly are our modern day Mr. Rogers!

Next week, New York will have their next mayoral election and it is looking like the favorite to win is Zohran Mamdani. Even despite governor Andrew Cuomo’s cringe inducing AI ads attacking Mamdani, it seems like it will stand no match for the hot new ticket in town. Zohran has been the victims of attacks on the right for being anti semantic for simply wanting peace in Palestine and for being a communist when he wants better wealth distribution in New York. In my opinion, Zohran is the type of candidate that can come in and challenge the MAGA movement in a powerful way. He is charismatic, he feels like a guy you could hang out with unlike several Democratic Politicians who feel like they are your high school principal. He even was friendly and got the Andrew Schulz podcast laughing and agreeing with him, a podcast that endorsed and voted for Trump in the last election. I do believe the ultra wealthy (both on the right and left) are deathly afraid of Zohran’s plans for democratic socialism in New York. This is because if it works, will the people prefer it and how much less power will they have overall? For me- this era of politics is dwindling from the right and the left and is now good vs evil. The elite class vs the working class, and Mamdani, love or hate some of his views and opinions is advocating for the working class. New York is in a terrible state at the moment, hardly anyone is able to survive there due to outrageous rent prices and the price of goods and services increasing at an alarming rate. Mamdani’s plans for city owned grocery stores and wealth distribution could help the middle to lower class actually be able to cultivate and live a life in the city and peruse their dreams again- instead of feeling like they are in a capitalistic hell scape that has been created against them. I don’t agree with everything Mamdani has said, but most of it I align with and I think his election will be a good shot in the arm for New York, especially against a serial abuser like Andrew Cuomo who has only been about cooperate interests.

That’s all I got this week, tune in for the weekly newsletter next Monday! Thanks for reading!

Making a biopic is always going to be a challenge for a filmmaker. So many have been made in the history of the medium and after a while, they start to all feel the same. The cradle to tomb scale of a biopic, following the highs and lows of an influential person’s life- has been parodied to death. This is why Benny Safdie’s newest film, The Smashing Machine is an admirable effort to break out of the mold. The film stars Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as Mark Kerr, a man who is at the top of his game and is one of the leading fighters in MMA fighting. This film chronicles his opioid addictions, struggles in the sport and his toxic relationship with his girlfriend Dawn played by Emily Blunt. This film is in every way a slice of life film, dropping us the viewer into the middle of Mark’s life and expecting us as the audience to catch up on needed context.

To give some context into this review, I am not very familiar with MMA fighting and did not know who Mark Kerr was until watching this film. That makes watching this film feel a little alarming at first- as it doesn’t hold your hand or give you necessary context. I think I was able to get mostly his relationships through the filmmaking, we start the film seeing Mark fight in the ring and then we see the way he lives in the real world. We see the way he signs an autograph for a kid and the way he talks to his girlfriend in appreciation but criticism after she makes him a protein shake with the wrong type of milk. This helps the set dressing to make Kerr look vulnerable and human. The film does a great job of making him a relatable figure worth following, even when he is making awful choices throughout the film.

This movie has incredible individual scenes where everyone is giving wonderful performances. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson shows he’s more than just charisma in this film. He dials back his movie star persona and gives a real and vulnerable performance in the film - he is Oscar worthy here. Emily Blunt as his girlfriend has to play off of his energy in several scenes where they have loud and bombastic fights and she holds her own very well here- these scenes are so hard to watch but handled with care. A standout in the film is Ryan Bader, who is giving his first ever film performance as someone who is a noteworthy MMA fighter himself. He plays Mark Coleman, who is Mark Kerr’s best friend and mentor. His performance here feels very naturalistic and he is the moral grounding of the film - the one character who completely acts in good faith and is there for his friends despite their struggles. The conclusion given to that character was the best part about it and I found his arc to be the most compelling arc of the film.

Overall, this movie is solid. It’s made up of some incredible vignettes that don’t entire equal up to the sum of its part. Benny Safdie’s direction is admirable, the dialogue is compelling and the performances are spectacular, but by the end of the movie I couldn’t help but want more out of the overall experience. You could explain this movie in just a few sentences to someone if you boil it down at it’s most basic parts and the story being told here is very formulaic to other biopics, even if in presentation it feels a little less conventional. There’s even some needle drops in the film that undermine the dramatic tension of some scenes, telling the audience how they are supposed to feel that I couldn’t help but feel like it came across kinda hokey.

There’s not a whole lot more to it. The film feels so aloof because of the context it lacks that the fly on the wall approach maybe wasn’t the best approach here. I couldn’t help but think of Sean Durkin’s excellent sports drama The Iron Claw that came out a few years ago. That movie, above any context about the sport surrounding it, was a story of brotherhood and sacrifice. While The Smashing Machine focuses more on the drama than the sport as well, the dramatic arcs of the characters aren’t nearly as compelling as they are in The Iron Claw, because the movie fails to elaborate their relationships to us from the get go. It’s okay to trust your audience and not have to tell them everything they need to know, but you should still give them the proper context to the emotional building blocks to your movie are effective - which is where this film is lacking in. Overall, it’s a good movie and I was consistently engaged in it, but it won’t be one that makes a lasting impression on me over time.

Before getting into the weeds of this review - I have to be upfront about where I land politically. If you disagree with me that’s fine, but there’s no way to beat around the bush when talking about this film. I believe the country is heading in a very dangerous place and I absolutely hate our current leadership and administration. The Trump Administration has pulled us all apart and politicized our differences and profited on them - all while hurting the working class and minorities. I also believe in peaceful resistance, the principals of a leader like Martin Luther King Jr. I believe in leading with love and building bridges, something that I’ve been taught my whole life through my faith. Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest film One Battle After Another is coming out at the exact right time - which is why it’s discourse might happen for the exact wrong reasons. The film star’s Leonardo DiCaprio as revolutionary Bob Ferguson, as his resistance group The French 75 in the opening scene infiltrate a ICE Detention center to free the immigrants being held hostage at the facility, guns a-blazing. Already from the opening shot of the film - the film makes it’s point clear. The revolutionaries advocating change, even with gunfire - are the heroes of this story. This film is loosely based on a book written by Thomas Pynchon called Vineland, a book that was written during the Regan Administration, where a lot of the horrors happening in the country weren’t entirely as high profile as they are now but were still just as horrific. One Battle After Another comes out at a time where there are a number of people who have unjustly villainized immigrants. I think even just ten years ago, the public opinion would be easily that the neo-nazi groups featured in this film were overtly evil and every person deserved equal rights, but times are changing in a jarring political landscape.

This is why One Battle After Another is an all timer of a movie, one I think will be featured in history books for years to come. To release this film right now is a daring move, especially in a time where Republicans tried to get Jimmy Kimmel off the air for saying stuff way less salacious than this movie. I will say myself, as someone who personally leans to the left politically even found aspects of the first act of this movie uncomfortable. Like I wrote before, I am someone who believes in peaceful resistance, something this movie isn’t making the case for. The characters we follow are doing a hostile resistance, blowing up buildings and holding people hostage to see systemic change. However, as a film viewer, I don’t want to always agree with the actions of my protagonists. That would be boring, I want to have my own ideas challenged. This was done perfectly a few months ago with the film Eddington, who’s protagonist was a MAGA coded sheriff.

One Battle After Another however, shows the pros and cons of the mindset of these revolutionaries and a few awful choices made by the most vocal member of the group played terrifically by Teyana Taylor is what sets off the major conflict of the film. If it wasn’t for her taking things too far for the group and compromising her own moral integrity (trying to avoid spoilers - apologies for the vagueness) the major conflict of this film could have been promptly avoided. The film comes into its own when the major characters in it become Leonardo DiCaprio and his daughter played by Chase Infiniti- who in my opinion steals the entire movie. When the film becomes about the two of the running away from the clutches of the neo-nazi white supremicist with his own motivations to kill them both, played by Sean Penn in a career best performance is when the film finds it’s footing and becomes one of the most visceral, action packed and entertaining movies I’ve seen in recent memory.

Paul Thomas Anderson is one of my favorite directors of all time, his opus There Will Be Blood I cite as one of the films that made me fall in love with the medium. His filmography is so dense with such great films that most everyone has a different favorite film of his. It’s not widely agreed upon what his best film is. I believe with the nature of this film, this is one that is gonna be an introduction to several people getting into film. One Battle After Another is Paul Thomas Anderson’s most accessible film to date. Which is a nice change of pace. As much as I admire his film Inherent Vice and adore his last film Licorice Pizza- those are fun hangout films made for a certain audience that will gravitate towards them. One Battle After Another is not as esoteric as anything else he’s ever made. This film is broadly an action comedy- that is tackling a lot of very serious and heavy topics with it. The film never feels too heavy though, making this a really entertaining time at the movies. The two hour and forty minute runtime to me felt like ninety minutes. I don’t there there’s anyone else making movies right now who paces things better than PTA, who continues to make large sprawling movies where every single scene feels essential.

It is weird that this film ends up playing out as a dark comedy, but I believe it is the right way to approach a lot of this subject matter. It has been said that the start of an authoritarian takeover starts with the censorship with comedians (something we are seeing play out in real time sadly) because comedy can bring out deep truths of individuals and their intentions. Making fun of how ridiculous these white nationalists look and sound is a wake up call to make us all realize how ridiculous the current times we are living in are. I cannot stress enough that these jarring tonal shifts are executed so well not just because of Paul Thomas Anderson’s perfect screenplay and immaculate directing, but the performances as well. This might be my favorite Leonardo DiCaprio character yet. Bob is a lovable washed up revolutionary stumbling along looking for his daughter- he gives off a lot of the vibes that The Dude does in The Big Lebowski. However, there is more of a moral center to his character that makes him more compelling to watch on screen in my opinion. Even in his vulgar rants and his ineptitude to adapt to the lingo of the 21st century, I was rooting for him because I knew he was a well meaning father before anything else. I would say in that regard he reminds me a bit of Homer Simpson. His daughter in the film is terrific as well, and acts as the moral center of the film who is trying to figure out her place in the universe. Their connection to one another is what gives the film an emotional core and makes the film feel incredibly poignant even outside everything it’s saying about our political landscape.

The film is a tour de force when it comes to direction. Paul Thomas Anderson demands your attention in every single scene. This film is entirely shot through VistaVision, and it’s so crisp in execution. I wish I lived closer to a VistaVision screening, because I cannot believe how visceral this film was watching it on a traditional movie screen. I would say to seek this movie out in the biggest and loudest format you can because it is a spectacle. The car chases in the film are filmed in a way I’ve never seen before. The points of views throughout these action set pieces had my mouth agape. It’s the best action set pieces I’ve seen since George Miller’s Mad Max Fury Road and elicited the same sense of awe from me. As someone who has studied film, made films and sees over a hundred films in theatres a year, it’s not very often where I have no idea how a film scene is made but this movie has sequences where I had no idea how they pulled it off. The car wrecks in this film felt so real that I would wince when they happened like I was waiting for a jump scare in a horror movie. It’s absolutely enthralling filmmaking, everything Paul Thomas Anderson has been building to his entire career.

This film is a perfect balancing act. It has sublime action set pieces, hilarious jokes, harrowing emotional beats and a timely message about heritage, activism and your role in making the world a better place. One Battle After Another is everything I want to see in the current landscape of film, and I have no real criticisms of it. I think Paul Thomas Anderson has made a film for the ages here, it’s one of his best films to date and I believe one of the best films of the decade so far.

The 50th Toronto International Film Festival has wrapped up, and I was honored to be invited to the festival as press this year. So today, I’m going to rank the films I saw at the festival, worst to best so you can keep some future titles on your radar, (or avoid some future titles coming up). Without any further ado, let’s start the count down.

17. Ballad of a Small Player

Ballad of a Small Player is the newest film from Edward Berger, the man who directed acclaimed films like All Quiet on the Western Front and Conclave. Since the man has directed some of the more critically acclaimed films of the last few years, his next film was on my radar to see at the festival. Sadly, it didn’t live up to his previous work. Not only did it not live up to his previous work, Ballad of a Small Player is one of the hardest movies I’ve ever had to sit through in a movie theatre. There is talent on display here. This movie has solid direction behind it, a really interesting aesthetic color palette and a dedicated performance by Collin Farrell. However, it feels like every wrong choice was made in this movie for me. The film is obnoxious, throwing sound and visual flair at you every two seconds but forgetting to be about something other then, “man having bad time gambling”. Some of the more surrealist elements reminded me of that Weeknd movie Hurry Up Tomorrow that came out and bombed earlier this year, but I’d argue that movie at least had me interested in what it was trying to do- even if it failed spectacularly. This movie fails on any sort of engagement, making it the movie I was the maddest at sitting through.

16. Scarlet

Scarlet was one of the most disappointing films I’ve seen so far this year. I am a big fan of Mamoru Hosada, I believe titles he’s directed such as Wolf Children and The Boy and the Beast are some of the most exceptional pieces of anime I’ve seen in the last few years. For my money, Hosada can be compared to the greats like Miyazaki and Kon. So what happened here? Scarlet is incomprehensible- and not in an interesting and abstract way. This film fails to elaborate on its existence for two hours. It simply feels like things are happening and as an audience we are supposed to simply subscribe to have investment in any of the characters or the stories. There is one abrupt musical number in the middle of the film that’s a lot of fun, but I cannot tell you why it’s even in the film. The film also looks ugly at times, there is more CGI implemented in this film juxtaposed with the traditional 2D animation and the technology wasn’t quite there yet, making this feel like a first draft that was sent to festivals.

15. The Christophers

The Christophers had it’s world premiere at Tiff this year, we went into this movie not knowing much other than the fact it’s directed by Steven Sodenberg, who has three movies that came out in the calendar year. Sodenberg is known for releasing a lot of movies, it seems he’s premiering something at Tiff every year. Last year he premiered Presence at the festival, am movie I ended up enjoying. I wish I could say the same about The Christophers. This movie has ideas about the art an artists makes and how much value it has outside of it’s creator. It has a solid performance by Ian McKellen that makes this film at least watchable at times. The film comes across as dull after a while, the direction here is static. The same shot compositions over and over again and nothing to make this film distinguishable as a film. I believe it would have worked better as a play where it would be allowed to have a stronger relationship with the audience. As a film, it never truly engaged me in any way.

14. Rental Family

Rental Family had a weird history at the TIFF film festival. This film was posed to be the breakout people’s choice winners at this years film festival, posing it as an Oscar contender. The film however, failed to even place at this years festival and is likely to be forgotten about now this award season race. This doesn’t indicate the quality of the film however, some of the best films ever made have been ignored by The Academy. Rental Family won’t be included on that list however. On the surface, Rental Family is a perfectly enjoyable and sentimental film with a lush score by Sigur Ros lead singer Jonsi and solid direction by Hikari. However, I couldn’t help but feel icky watching this movie because the entire movies premise is predicated on gaslighting. Most of the movie is our main character doing something morally reprehensible and then having to learn its wrong and he’s hurt people but hey it’s okay, as long as he says sorry he’s okay to continue to keep the relationships of the people he’s met based on a lie! It screams a white savior narrative that’s surrounded by a morally reprehensible premise, so I’m happy we won’t have to be talking about this one anymore this award season unless it makes a surprise comeback.

13. Blue Moon

I hate that I have to put this one so low because Richard Linklater is one of my favorite directors of all time and Ethan Hawke is one of my favorite actors of all time and them collaborating on a movie about lyricist Lorenz Hart feeling betrayed after the opening night of the musical Oklahoma I thought was a fascinating premise for this movie. The fact this film only has a few locations and happens in real time I also thought was great framing. Something felt missing from this film however and I left the movie feeling underwhelmed. I think the script is pretty sharp and tight, but the film itself lacked any sort of mis en scene. The cinematography was static for the most part and the color grading felt incredibly drab. This movie felt like a made for TV movie in production value, which took me out of the film. Ethan Hawke is giving a huge performance here which I appreciated, but his portrayal of Hart for the most part felt a little over the top to me. Overall I didn’t think this was a bad film by any means, I just think it’s a lesser Linklater film in my opinion. Don’t worry though, we will be talking about another film he had at the festival I really enjoyed later on.

12. The Testament of Ann Lee

The Testament of Ann Lee was one of my most anticipated movies of the entire festival. It is brought to us by the same creative team as The Brutalist, which is not only my favorite movie of last years TIFF but one of my favorite movies in recent memory. Testament of Ann Lee has the same audacious ambitions of The Brutalist, but falls short of being great. This movie has immaculate cinematography, an immaculate score, a sweeping sense of scale and a show stopping performance by Amanda Seyfried but that sadly all gets undermined by a movie that lacks any sense of story structure. I do appreciate a more arthouse approach to storytelling but when it undermines the strong messages the movie is trying to convey and makes the film feel like a slog after a while, I think this was a swing and a miss sadly. There’s not enough build up in some moments to make the story really flourish and there’s too much focus on other scenes that make the films pace feel off. It’s certainly worth watching, but there’s a great movie in here that’s sadly not developed enough.

11. Space Cadet

Adorable! Sadly not many people at TIFF saw Space Cadet, but it is a really charming animated movie that reminded me a little bit of Robot Dreams but a lot slighter than that film. This is a movie that children are going to love for it’s whimsy and charm but parents will appreciate the poignancy of the film’s framing about discovering yourself after you say goodbye. It’s such a sweet little film, I beg you to seek it out.

10. Wake Up Dead Man

Using the new Knives Out movie as a tool to explore using the church as a weapon instead of a tool for love is something I think was totally admirable for Rian Johnston to do with this franchise. It makes Wake Up Dead Man feel a lot more admirable than Glass Onion, the last film in the Knives Out franchise that I didn’t really care that much for. There’s a lot more to thematically chew on with Wake Up Dead Man, which I ultimately really enjoyed. However, the deeper themes about religion can’t help but be undermined at times by the film needing to be about a murder mystery. I wish this film dug a little deeper into it’s themes. I like the gothic approach the film takes with the material, one shot in particular felt like a horror movie and I loved it. I wish the film had pushed that tone as well. Overall, you have a good film here with great ideas. I liked it more than Glass Onion but it still fails to live up to the first film, which I believe is one of the best murder mystery films ever made.

9. It Was Just An Accident

This year’s Palme D’or winner was the new film from Jafar Panahi. It Was Just An Accident, which is an excellent film wrestles with political violence, vengeance and justice for marginalized people. It is a film that will unfortunately only become more and more timely as the weeks go on in our country and the parallels we are seeing in this film vs what is going on in the United States are pretty damning. However, it is different circumstances entirely, but that doesn’t stop this film from feeling totally universal. It’s engaging to see these character struggle and argue on how to deal with a war criminal that is in the back of their car and the conversations sprawl from funny to absolutely devastating and it tonally never feels off. This movie isn’t a slog, it’s incredibly engrossing and has a mic drop of an ending that won’t leave me anytime soon. I could see this film being an awards contender by the end of the year.

8. Train Dreams

Train Dreams is a gorgeous and existential tale of a logger who experiences love and loss as he goes through life and wonders what the purpose of any of it is. It’s a calming film that is reminiscent of Terrence Malick at times. The score and the cinematography make this low stakes film feel epic and sprawling in scope. The film feels so personal, moments in the film don’t feel like they amount to much until you get to the end of the film where you start to understand the scale and scope of all of our lives. While we aren’t all loggers that experience the harsh conditions nature can bring like the protagonist of this film does- this film is a nice reminder that a life is worth living even with the inevitable heart break that it brings along with it.

7. Hamnet

Hamnet was the breakout hit of TIFF this year, this was agreed upon the most successful film of this years festival winning the coveted ‘People’s Choice’ award. I think Hamnet is an excellent film. Chloe Zhao directs this film with a lot of passion and craft. Every sequence looks like a painting. The performances are also terrific with the standout being Jessie Buckley, who should easily be winning The Oscar this year. Her portrayal as a grieving mother is harrowing and heart wrenching. This movie is astounding, but it is a film I more so appreciated for the craft of it which is remarkable. It is a hard watch, but a rewarding one all the same.

6. Eternity

Eternity, the newest sweeping romance from studio A24- is perhaps the most crowd pleasing film the studio has ever released and I got swept up in it. The story about rather a woman will choose to spend her afterlife with her husband of over sixty years or a man she fell in love with who died in war is one that is sure to illicit tears from the audience. I was shocked this film didn’t place at people’s choice, because I heard several people who saw it sing it’s praises. The world building in this film reminds me of something Pixar would come up with. It’s so well established and there’s a lot of great gags in this film. The way this world operates is so fascinating and it leads to some of the most striking production design I’ve seen in a film this year. I also believe it is my favorite Miles Teller performance to date, he has a challenging role here to play a grieving 80 year old man discovering himself again in his younger body and he channels that so well. This is a film that swept me up in it’s romance and I believe the overall message of the film is really timely and thoughtful.

5. Bad Apples

Bad Apples was my biggest surprise at TIFF this year and I am begging you to seek this film out when it comes out. Bad Apples is about a school teacher who ends up finding herself in a situation where she can keep her evil student out of her classroom and how that reflects back on her as a teacher. When the evil student is gone from her classroom, she gains more respect from her faculty and is able to have deeper connections to the rest of the students in her class. Twists and turns arise here however, and we have one of the tensest and funniest movies I’ve seen in recent memory. Saoirse Ronan gives one of her best performances in this movie as the school teacher, who is immediately identifiable to anyone who’s ever felt like an outcast at their job. Following her journey, even when she is obviously doing things she shouldn’t be doing, I was always rooting for her to get away with it because her motivation is so compelling. This is going to become elementary school teacher’s Joker and I’m here for it. It’s so funny and genuinely went places that I was not expecting it to.

4. Nouvelle Vague

I told you guys we would talk about another Richard Linklater film much later on in this list. It was really cool to see him premiere two films at this year’s film festival, but you could tell all of his passion went into this film which is his best film since Boyhood in my opinion. Nouvelle Vague is about the story of how the french film Breathless got made and the unconventional and care free approach Jean Luc Godard took when making the film. The final result is a wonderful and charming french film about the power of going outside with your crew and making a movie just for the pure fun of it. Aspects of the film reminded me of the chaotic energy of an episode of The Muppet Show. The references and cameos to french new wave cinema is likely to have any film studies excited. It’s a love letter to the art form. Some people will accuse the film of being hagiographic, but I believe the film is a slice of life look on how some art gets made due to the pure passion of it, it’s not an instruction manual or a glorification of Godard but rather a funny look into his overall process as an auteur filmmaker.

3. Frankenstein

By far and away my most anticipated movie of TIFF and most people’s was Guillermo Del Toro’s adaptation of Frankenstein. For years, Del Toro has wanted to make his adaptation of the beloved movie monster and now he has finally had his chance to. A noted Mary Shelley enthusiast, Del Toro makes this film a more solid adaptation of the book than the original 1940’s James Whale film was. The final result is a confounding movie that is a lot more complicated in theme than a lot of people will be expecting. This adaptation of Frankenstein is not a horror movie, but an examination of autonomy. The two part structure of the film shows Del Toro’s angle of the film pointedly, he wants us to see all sides of a story and to emphasize with everyone- especially the misunderstood monsters of the world. Jacob Elordi, who plays Frankenstein’s monster in this film gives one of the best performances I’ve seen in recent memory. The way he is able to mold us interpretation of this iconic character was incredibly profound. Throughout the film, you start to understand that thematically most all of Del Toro’s work has themes of Frankenstein strung throughout, making this feel like the thesis statement to his entire body of work. It reminds me of what Peter Jackson did with his adaptation of King Kong, which is another slow paced film where he is tackling the morality of Kong himself. Frankenstein is incredible, but I do believe some will struggle with its slower pace and lack of thrills. This is a character study first and foremost and a pointedly introspective character study at that.

2. Poetic License

I was surprised by how much I loved Poetic License and I can see it being the film from this years festival I go back to the most in the upcoming years. This movie is a total comfort watch, I love the fall aesthetic the film has, it’s so cozy. Along with the nice vibes comes a really engaging coming of age story about a forty year old woman played by Leslie Mann who discovers she is lost in the world and needs guidance and is able to find her free spirit through the comradery of two friends she meets in a poetry class she is auditing. A standout performance here is Cooper Hoffman, who is proving to be one of the best young actors of his generation. He has an entirely different screen presence than his father Phillip Seymour Hoffman did in films and it’s cool to see him finding his own identity after his breakout role in Licorice Pizza a few years ago. This movie is a charming breezy film that had me laughing consistently, this film has so many funny lines and I can be a hard laugh in a movie. Maybe it’s the Apatow connection to the whole film since Judd Apatow’s daughter Maude directed this movie but this gave me a similar feeling I had watching Freaks and Geeks for the first time and that’s the biggest compliment I could give a movie. I love this movie a lot and cannot wait for more people to be able to see it.

1. No Other Choice

No Other Choice is not only the best film at TIFF in my opinion, but it will be among my favorite films of the entire year. This is the new film from Park Chan-wook who continues to show why he is a master at his craft. This film is a lot more straight forward than some of his more melodic and surrealist films in the past but I also think that is what makes No Other Choice one of his best films (if not his best film) to date. The film will be inevitably compared to Parasite which I think is unfair expectations to put on the film itself because the angle is different. This movie is a movie that condemns capitalism but it’s pointedly about what it does to the individual. The fact that in the world, you are only defined and valued by your job. Without a job, you lack any sort of social status and cannot provide for a family. Without a good enough job that can keep you afloat, you start to loose your identity and that is an existentially terrifying thought. Lee Byung-hun gives the best leading actor performance of the year so far as a father in a desperate situation who will go at any lengths to keep his family happy and to be able to continue to keep up with his various hobbies. He’s an identifiable protagonist and even when he starts doing reprehensible things out of desperation to get this job he knows he’s perfect for, I was always rooting for him because I cared about him and his family. The film perfectly sets you up for the chaos that’s about to happen and why you should be invested in it. It reminds me of the arc Walter White has in Breaking Bad and I found the film to be consistently riveting and a great deep look at the horrors the working class has to go through and how capitalism pits us against each other instead of bringing us together like it should. This film also features some of the best action set pieces I’ve seen in recent memory. There is a scene that involves several gloves that is one of the best directed sequences of film I’ve seen in recent memory. No Other Choice is an incredible film and I really hope it gets the attention and love it deserves this awards season.

That are all of the films I saw at TIFF! What are some titles you are excited for and if you went to the festival, what is your ranking?

One of the most fascinating aspects of horror in my opinion is the moments before the event takes place and the ramifications of the said horror. Scary and terrifying things happen within our culture all of the time, but we never delve into the ramifications, the aftermath of scary events. People are forever changed. If a serial killer went on a killing spree- he’s going to impact a lot more lives than just the people he killed. Those peoples have families, these people lived in a community that is now shattered forever. David Lynch’s groundbreaking show Twin Peaks is the perfect example of a show that starts with the tragedy, the death of Laura Palmer and then the horror is seeing the innocence and facade of a town slowly decade.

In Weapons, we get an opening narration that sets the stage for us. This is done with a little girl being very soft spoken. This choice feels like Zach Creggor telling his audience to shut up, it’s time for us to listen and discover this movie and it’s twists and turns. We learn that seventeen children, all from the same classroom one day all walked out of their houses and into the night. Narratively, Weapons is similar to Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia as we see the viewpoints and perspectives of several people who are effected by this event. Some more directly than others. The first viewpoint we see is from the third grade teacher who’s class disappeared into the night and we see her struggle as the town declare her a witch.

I won’t spoil every point of views, but some of them are just adjacent to the incident at hand, showing how an event like this can have a ripple effect. I found this to be one of the most compelling parts of this movie. Zach Creggor likes to linger on characters, showing us their every day lives and having us connect with them on a deeper level until he pulls out the rug from under us as we discover new revelations in this mystery.

Zach Creggor is excellent on creating simple haunting imagery and creating so much tension within one scene. In jazz music, sometimes it’s about the notes you don’t play as much as the ones you do play- and this is what makes Weapons feel like jazz. It does feel like Creggor is only going to give you what he needs in a certain moment, to keep the audience engaged and guessing until the very final moment. The mystery box element of this movie is what keeps it fresh. Filmmaker J.J. Abrams have several times addressed the idea of creating a mystery box, always keeping your audience at your feet until it’s the perfect time to reveal. Don’t spoon feed them anything- keep them on edge.

The only issue with the mystery box approach is you need to deliver on an ending that will wow the audience. Does Weapons do that? I believe so. With how much the marketing and word of mouth has praised this movie for how crazy it gets, I do see some people maybe being underwhelmed by the reveal. I dare not spoil it here, but that’s not the films fault and more so the expectations of the audiences seeing the film. I think this film perfectly sets up a gloriously bonkers third act that has parts that had me equal parts creeped out and laughing hysterically and isn’t that what you want from a horror movie?

Approaching a review for a movie like Weapons is difficult because it’s one of those movies that’s better the less you know about it. I remember being pretty blind walking into Creggor’s last film Barbarian and being startled by it. I thought it was really creative and inspired and was excited to see what he was making next. He delivers with Weapons, making a movie that’s larger and more ambitious in every way. I’m not sure what it’s trying to convey on a deeper thematic level, but as blockbuster horror entertainment that is told creatively and is incredibly sharp and subversive- you can’t get much better than this movie. I had an absolute blast with it and would call it one of the best horror movies to come out in the past few years.

One of the first scenes of Ari Aster’s brilliant Eddington shows sheriff Joe Cross (played brilliantly by Joaquin Phoenix) walk into a convenience store without a mask on. After having a very public argument with the towns mayor Ted Garcia (Pedro Pascal) he buys groceries and walks out of the store. He gives these groceries to a man who tried entering the building without a mask before he went in, handing them off to him. The man proceeds to praise Cross for his noble action and takes a picture with him. When Cross sits in his car, he sees a picture the man took of him on Facebook stating ‘one decent guy left in Eddington’ with a sense of elation and a sweeping score to ascend the moment, Joe Cross leaves the place feeling like a superhero, a figure the people need in this moment.

This moment, in context of the pandemic and the intentions of the right wing during this time plays different in the political context we are in. It’s uncomfortable and the film forces you to sit in the discomfort. This is what makes Eddington easily the most transgressive and off putting film I’ve seen in theatres this year - and I really loved it. If you don’t want to be reminded of the 2020 Pandemic in any way and believe it’s too soon to reflect on it- Eddington is going to be a miserable time in the theatre. I believe it is a fascinating dissection, forcing us in the point of view of a deeply troubled man with a savior complex.

Joe Cross is the protagonist of this film and this is the type of man that exacerbated the riled tensions of the pandemic. A man who refused to do the right thing because he believed it was an agenda. He wanted to be a free agent, even if that individualistic liberty cost the safety of the people he was sworn in to protect. Phoenix is incredible in the role, helping us actually heavily sympathize with a character we don’t want to. The framing of the film is one of the most challenging aspects of the film and it was a bold choice for Aster to make the protagonist of the film the man we would villainize. It’s a juxtaposition that will off put some audiences seeing the film.

There’s a subplot involving the son of the Ted Garcia, Eric. It explores Eric going out and hanging out with friends in groups even though there is a strict no gathering regulation in the town. What we discover is that this group of friends are actually very politically savy. They believe in Covid, they believe in the Black Lives Matter movement and want to change the political system. Eric’s best friend Brian at first doesn’t care about any of this- looking for a good time and that’s it. This is until he develops a crush on a girl that is a progressive activist and starts to change his thought process and speech just to impress her.

These kids start to get in Joe Cross’ way, taking him as the enemy since in many ways he is. However, the film paints this kids as out of their element in some ways. I believe the films simple jabs at these kids who are discussing themes of radical change without truly understanding the implications of what they are even talking about will certainly ignite rage in some of the audience seeing this movie. The framing of these teenagers at times feels like commentary you would see on the Ben Shapiro show, about some advocates screaming in your face and not really doing anything but cause distress in a town. These moments however, play into an overall broader concept of the movie at large. This films first half plays like a conservatives dream. The unassuming town sheriff runs for town mayor to get the town back to its more conservative values and to stop the progressives from stealing the core values of the town at large. This movie is satirically riffing on this idea however, showing just how shallow Cross is as an individual, how he is just as much if not more emotionally compromised than the protestors that have been framed as the issue in his own head.

One of my favorite details of this film is on Cross’ sheriff vehicle there is a sign that states “Your Being Manipulated” which is of course an illiterate slogan. It’s little things like that early on that shows that Aster is not giving this character a break, he is the punchline of the film. It reminds me of the sitcom Married with Children. While Al Bundy is the main character of that show and we see the show mostly through his point of view, he’s a loser, manipulator and sexist and the show consistently laughs at him for having a terrible worldview. Ari Aster is doing the same type of humor here as well and I think it’s ultimately effective.

This movie takes a dark turn in the second act that I won’t spoil here, but after that this movie becomes a much grimmer film. Showing that yes, some of the stuff that happened in the 2020 pandemic in retrospect was funny but ultimately it was a very tragic time that showed the true colors of several people in our community. It unmasked a lot of political tension (no pun intended) we are still seeing the ramifications of to this day. A lot of people have accused Aster of making a centrist film, where he just throws his hands up in the air and states “we are all corrupt and evil!”, without providing how he believes we could change the system. I do agree that Aster’s worldview in the film is a nihilistic one and that being a conclusion you could make after watching this two and a half hour film might be infuriating, but I think saying this is a centrist dissection of the film is not the right lens to see the film through.

I believe Aster’s film is a film dissecting everyone’s super ego. How easy it is for the American public to take something tragic like a global pandemic and even a civil rights protest and make it about us vs making it about the true pain these events can bring on an entire community. This is presented through some of the characters in the film shifting their ideology just due to how much monetary gain they will have being on a certain side of the aisle, not due to any moral values or principals. This film is an interesting dissection not only of the Ben Shapiro type protagonist, but the characters in the film that take the direction of someone like Tulsi Gabbard or Dave Rubin- commentators in the space that used to have a progressive mindset until they were offered more power on the opposing side. This movie is all about the power imbalances and how towns and the people of that town can shape and fold depending on their own self interests. The movie should make you uncomfortable and it should make you feel self reflective no matter what side of the political aisle you are. This film is showing the dangers of an unchecked libertarian mindset and it is a broad satire of the so called ‘free thinkers’ in this country who have made their bed with right wing ideologies. However, it also challenges it’s audience to do self reflection in yourself. It is not saying that political activism and fighting for a better life is a bad thing, it is just asking if your values are with the cause or if your selfishness is getting in the way of your own ideologies.

Eddington is a technically immaculate film. Really wonderfully realized town, I love the production design of the film. This movie screams rural New Mexico and I have a soft spot about movies that have well established rural roots regardless, so this film had me engaged from the start. I think the way Aster is able to bring tension and dread in every scene is so well established. He’s one of our best directors right now because he knows exactly what he is selling to his audience and the way he wants to make them feel. He captures the anxiety of a situation better than any other director I’ve seen making movies just by where he places the camera and framing what we see in frame and what we can only imagine what is going on outside of it. My only real gripes with the film is I thought Cross’ wife (played by Emma Stone) and the cult leader she takes interest in (played by Austin Butler) were under served in the story and could have been fleshed out a little more. In that regard, there’s so many ideas being presented in this movie being thrown at you at once that it can’t help but feel exhausting at times, but I believe that’s the intent. This does leave some ideas of the film feeling under cooked where I think they could have been even more compelling.

Overall, Eddington is a very daring film and one that will have walk outs by people of all sorts of different ideologies. What Ari Aster has made here is a compelling conversation piece that stems perfectly into the hellscape that is political tensions in the 2020’s. If you are going to the movies for escapism this is not the right film to go see. You have to sit in your discomfort, in the same way you do with Ari Aster’s last film Beau is Afraid. While that film takes a deep turn into surrealism, Eddington is the most grounded approach that Ari Aster has done yet. There’s no supernatural elements in this film but somehow it’s equally as terrifying as his previous three films. This is because sometimes, the truth is stranger than fiction- which is perfectly distilled in this harrowing piece of film making I won’t soon forget. I know some people think Ari Aster has fallen off as a director, but I’ve loved all four of his films so far and appreciate the ambitions of a man telling stories no one else would.

Ever since superhero films have invaded the film circuit, they have caused a lot of controversy and division with the public. People run out to go see them and then complain about the over saturation of superhero films. I love a good comic book movie, a good comic book movie should be a vibrant and colorful explosion of imagination. Instead, recently we have gotten a lot of superhero and comic book films that have the aesthetic sensibilities of a seven o clock cable network television show. This has led to the question ‘does the general public have superhero fatigue’? I think the bigger question is this, ‘does the general public have franchise fatigue’.

I recently saw the new Jurassic World movie and genuinely loathed it because it felt like such an afterthought of a movie. Let’s put this quota in for the general public to think overall it wasn’t an entire waste of time and they can tell their coworkers “yeah I guess that was pretty good because there’s a few scenes with dinosaurs in it that reminded me of a much better movie I saw thirty years ago.’ I think that’s where the fatigue comes from - people milking the same properties and not doing anything new or interesting with said property, just making a film that will be a product a consumer will pay ten dollars to see due to their attachment to a certain franchise.

James Gunn’s Superman is a film that had to prove itself. This film is the start to a new version of the DC cinematic universe after the first attempt was a colossal failure. However, the supposed ‘Snyderverse’ still have it’s cultist fan base that will hate anything that doesn’t involve Henry Cavil’s Superman from that universe. James Gunn is also facing the biggest elephant in the room - is the comic book film a dying genre? The answer after this movie is an astounding no.

James Gunn breathed new life in the Marvel Universe over ten years ago when he introduced us to the Guardians of the Galaxy on screen- and the man has done it again for their competitors at DC. Superman is a triumph of a movie - I would argue it is one of the best superhero films I have ever seen. I put it right up there with Sam Rami’s opus Spider-Man 2. Why does it work so well? James Gunn has decided to embrace what makes comics so fun to begin with- the goofy campiness of it all.

Superman is a bonkers movie. It has a super powered dog named Krypto, giant kaiju battles, pocket dimensions, space octopuses- it’s unabashedly a Saturday morning cartoon. This is the exact opposite approach that Zack Snyder took with the Superman character with Man of Steel - which was a much darker and more grounded approach. While I don’t hate Man of Steel, this one resonated with my sensibilities a lot more. For two hours, I had a silly grin on my face watching the chaos unfold on screen.

Let me reiterate here, there is chaos in this movie. This movie is juggling so much and has so many characters and plots and Gunn somehow is able to juggle everything in a perfect crescendo. It’s a balancing act and a miracle this movie works as well as it is. It is a very ambitious film and since we have had a string of pretty uninspired comic book films of late, it was nice to see a film swing for the fences like this one and knock it out of the park.

David Corenswet plays Clark Kent, but he’s mostly Superman here and is my favorite iteration of the character I’ve seen on screen- which is saying a lot. I do like Cavil’s portrayal of Superman in the Snyder movies, but he is so God like to the point he is pretty unrelatable. Corenswet feels like a guy who just got off his farm in Smallville and has the joyful optimism of doing the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. Even when his good intentions are reckless, all he sees are the good he’s trying to provide for people. This movie wrestles with the fact that people are cynical to pure optimism and good will because it is a virtue that is becoming rarer and rarer in our society. The idea that even if Superman is here for good, will his presence as a super powered alien be enough of a danger in the public eye where Superman is actually a bad thing for a society? Gunn’s films wrestles with these questions head first and Gunn gives us the answers. Yes, there is good in people and the idea of Superman is a good one- even if the pure presence of a force that powerful is an overwhelming idea in the human consciousness. Corenswet plays this beautifully, wrestling with the pathos of an outsider trying to find his place in the world. While he is Superman, he is reckless and he doesn’t have the answers to every situation he finds himself in (especially the sociopolitical ones) and being super is also figuring out your place and your limitations- and evolving from that.

Lois Lane, his girlfriend played terrifically by Rachel Brosnahan presses Clark about how involved he should be in every situation. Since Clark can be as powerful as a nuclear bomb, maybe dropping that bomb in a place is a dangerous power move, even if it’s meant with well intentions. Early in the film, the two have an interview that turns into an argument that is so acutely written by Gunn. It’s a terrific scene that shows that Superman is going to be wrestling with a lot internally while he’s fighting the external threats that Lex Luther throws at him. Lois questions Clark early on in the film about him interviewing himself as Superman for The Daily Planet- and how that’s compromised journalism. At first, we see Clark be dismissive about that, saying he’s doing the right thing and giving the right answers needed for people to see he’s a hero. We see throughout the rest of the film, rather it be Lex Luther’s plan to make more money and gain more power or a tyrannical war criminals path for power and devastation that framing is everything. You have to give the public all of its information unbiased to get to the truth- even if you believe the bias being presented is in good intentions because most of the villains throughout history believed the roads were paved with good intentions as well.

This film has been controversial from some figures on the right for being ‘too woke’ which is a ridiculous complaint about this movie. Superman is an immigrant, who was sent down to Earth. He decides to save and protect the people of Earth, even if they are afraid of him, because deep down he is a good person at heart. Lex Luther is a bad person, because he’s a rich billionaire oligarch on a path for more power so he can run the city the way he believes would benefit himself the most. This power of good vs evil has been prevalent since the start of storytelling, and if you take issue on the film presenting your side as the antagonist, then that’s projecting you are putting on yourself and maybe it’s time to do some soul searching and figure out maybe you are on the wrong team. This is one of the themes in the film, Superman first wants to change hearts. He doesn’t want to kill anyone or have any retribution- but to change hearts and minds. That’s a true hero. This moral fabric is all weaved by Ma and Pa Kent, his parents who raised him. While they aren’t his blood parents, the two have a hopeful optimistic view of the American Dream and what it can be. Their humble origins help them see the best of people and that gets passed down to their son. If two other more cynical and sleazy people found Clark and raised him, this could have been a much different film. This film understands that our moral fabric isn’t defined by blood- but by our life experiences and the people we associate ourselves with that help shape our values and understand the world around us.

James Gunn makes this a beautiful piece of film making about hope and compassion. Yet, he never misses a beat when it comes to cooking up an entertaining blockbuster. This movie above all else is a great time at the movies. It has incredible action set pieces, a crazy colorful cast of characters, zany and effective humor and a large sense of scale we don’t see much from blockbusters anymore. This film feels larger than life, but at it’s emotional core is a human story about all of us- and how we should strive to be better and see the good in the world despite ourselves. I can safely say that James Gunn has started off the DC Universe strong and I’m incredibly excited to see where this universe goes next and hope the future film installments have the same sense of wonder and imagination this film does.

Thunderbolts is the newest Marvel movie that actually has substance! Brett and Jared discuss the themes of Thunderbolts and the way it addresses mental health, as well they discuss the Cannes film festival and what they anticipate from the festival.

I've been really harsh on the recent output of Disney (as a major self proclaimed Disney adult) these movies have recently felt uninspired, lacking any sort of emotion that made me fall in love with the Disney catalogue as a kid. Especially the live action adaptations of the original cartoons that are so beloved. These films have felt incredibly hollow, an after thought to chase a wave of nostalgia. I had hope for Lilo and Stitch going into it however, because I really liked the look of the trailer. The film is directed by Dean Fleischer Camp, coming straight off of the wonderful A24 film Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, which is genuinely one of my favorite films of the decade so far. I also believe the original Lilo & Stitch, while being a movie I love has improvements you can make in it. A movie like Beauty and the Beast or The Lion King are pretty much flawless pieces of cinema- why ever adapt them again? Lilo and Stitch, while a remarkable animated film, has stuff you could further develop- specifically with the bond of the sisters and their straining relationship, which is strong aspect of the first film. However, that juxtaposed with the science fiction subplot involving stitch is a lot to stuff into an eighty minute movie. Maybe a live action adaptation would allow these plot lines to further develop with a longer run time.

To my pleasant surprise, the film actually does make some improvements on the original film - and that’s a first I can say about any of the live action adaptation. This is by no means a perfect movie and the animated film is still overall a much stronger film, but there were aspects of the film I thought were very strong. The best part of this movie is the sisters and their relationship. Maia Kealoha and Sydney Agudong play Lilo and Nani and I believe they give really good performances here. This movie is much more grounded than the original and while that undermines the humor it does give the film a sense of realism that the original doesn’t have. The human emotion in this film comes across strong, this movie is really heartwarming. The social worker here is not Cobra Bubbles but instead a well meaning old woman who wants to see the best for these sisters who are wrestling with tragedy trying to mend the broken pieces together. Cobra Bubbles still is in the movie as a CIA officer- and his presence is interesting to say the least. There’s a new neighbor character in the film as well and all of these people are well intentioned and well meaning. There’s no ill will in the early parts of the film, just characters trying to figure out a difficult situation and I found that to be refreshing. When Stitch is introduced into the family, he does do some wild antics and things you would expect Stitch to do, but it never gets in the way of the emotion of the story. When this movie needs to slow down and have an emotional moment, it takes its time to do so making several scenes resonate. This film has even more moments to breathe in a moment because the film is longer and the film does utilize it’s longer running time effectively.

I love the look of this film, I think the film captures Hawaii really well. The place is just as much of a character in this film as it is in the animated film. While the colors don’t pop as much in the life action adaptation, I liked the approach they took with the aesthetic of the film and making it feel a lot dirtier than the animated movie. It feels lived in which I appreciated. However, like a lot of these live action adaptation, Lilo and Stitch is a deeply flawed film that doesn’t quite capture the magic of the original.

This is mostly. because of the way the film handles it’s science fiction elements. I believe the original film this is the weakest aspect as well. I like the alien and the lore in the Lilo and Stitch universe but when the act three action set piece happens in the animated movie I always loose a little of interest until the very end of the movie. This is no different in the live action adaptation, except here it’s significantly worse. Jumba and Pleakley, two aliens sent to capture Stitch were really funny and eccentric side characters in the original film. In this movie, both of the characters appear as human for most of the film. The film was originally supposed to be straight to streaming on Disney Plus, which means this films budget is smaller than your typical live action remake and this seems like a decision made for that reason alone. Captain Gantu, the big villain in the animated film is not in the new adaptation. Jumba is now the main antagonist of this movie- which is a decisive bold choice for this live action adaptation to go. I do appreciate this movie going in a different direction with its third act since I believe these movies should be reinterpretations and not just repeats of the original, but at the same time Jumba is a beloved character that is pretty mistreated here as the result of this change. I wouldn’t disagree with someone saying this is character assassination. I found the interpretations of Jumba and Pleakley in this movie to be pretty terrible and misguided all around and they unfortunately take a lot of screen time away that could be used to help further develop what this movie is doing so well.

I also believe the character David is undermined in this adaptation of the movie. David, in the original animated film is the biggest green flag in the history of cinema. He’s humble, nice, considerate and always there for Nani when she needs him to be. In this movie, he is still a kind presence but he comes across more as a simp in this movie than in the animated one. He reminded more of Freddie Benson in iCarly than anything else, which made him a little less interesting than he was in the original.

I know I keep bringing up the animated movie and it’s hard not to. This movie will always live in the shadows of one of the most beloved animated films of the last twenty years claimed by multiple generations. This movie cannot capture the goofy chaotic energy that made the original so special because you can only achieve something as eccentric as the original Lilo & Stitch in animation. On it’s own merits however, I liked this movie! It’s a miracle I’m saying that since I usually strongly dislike these live action adaptations but I found that the soul of the lead two performances and the wonderful presentation of Stitch, who is adorable in this movie is enough to recommend it despite it’s flaws.

I’ve struggled with my thoughts on Clown in a Cornfield since I watched the movie last night. This movie is entertaining enough- but waits too long to make the final reveal, making most of this movie feel like a riff on so many other movies you’ve seen before. The movie is about a girl and her father moving to a small town in the midwest after the death of her mother. She gets involved with a group of friends who aren’t the most responsible who like to make videos showing the towns mascot, Frendo, viscously murder people. The videos blend into reality as this group of teens discover there is actually multiple people dressing up as the clown and murdering people in real life, and there’s an underlining conspiracy to why this is happening as well.

From me describing the plot, you probably already understand that this movie is filled with typical horror movie troupes. Throughout most of this movie, I kept thinking how it was a struggle between a really strong director with a lacking script. The movie plays out similarly to how a Disney Channel Original Movie would. The characters are all very broad- the dialogue is spelling out everything you need to know about everything going on in the story and motivations of the characters. There is no nuance in this movie, but the campier sensibilities of the film also help it feel inherently more nostalgic. This has that ‘2000s TV Movie vibe” in it, while having great production value. The way director Eli Craig is able to build tension in a scene is wholly effective. One of the earlier shots follows a teen walking his house looking for the clown thinking it’s one of his friends dressed up as a clown- and I was watching the scene with my arms gripped to my chair waiting for the clown to jump out of the most unexpected place and where that clown finally emerges was brilliant. This is what helps the film feel entertaining, a good sense of timing and place. I love the overall aesthetic of the film as well, it’s drenched in Halloween vibes and made me nostalgic for the fall. In all honesty- releasing this in May was a major mistake for the studio. This is the exact campy and schlocky horror movie with cozy vibes that would have done really well in September.

The movie has a third act reveal that does paint the rest of the movie in a new light. While I appreciated this third act reveal and the film actually daring to be about something deeper than it first appeared to be, I felt like the reveal was a little too late into the movie. I think figuring out who these clowns are and their motivations is really funny- but also provocative. I can see people being offended by what the film is trying to convey with the third act twist and that’s why I admire it so much. It doesn’t pull back it’s punches on exactly who it is making fun of, and the themes surrounding this small town come to play in a compelling way. However, I do believe if this film wasn’t played so broadly, this third act reveal could have been even more poignant. This film screams at you what it wants you to learn and take away from the film and the film doesn’t feel like it properly sets up this reveal other than laying a few obvious lines in the first twenty minutes.

So overall, I’m mixed on Clown in a Cornfield. There’s a lot to like about this movie and as an entertaining romp in the horror canon, it’s wholly effective and fun fluff. The movie fights to be about something deeper and I believe with a stronger script it could have gotten there, meaning there is a bit of a missed opportunity.

We are halfway through the decade! So today I will count down what my fifty favorite films of this decade are so far, showing that this decade for cinema has been strong so far.

Thunderbolts, the newest film from Marvel Studios - is one that promised to be different. It is ironic that the film about the outside misfits and D list Marvel anti heroes is set to be the film to be the ‘actual good Marvel movie’ of the last few years, since I think Marvel themselves are the antiheroes of the film industry at the moment. You see, when acclaimed filmmaker Martin Scorsese came out to say that superhero cinema (particularly Marvel movies) weren’t real cinema to him, a lot of cinephiles followed suit and started to claim they didn’t believe Marvel constituted as cinema either. For me, I don’t ever think you can take a certain type of film or genre and say that the entire art form isn’t one thing, while I understand what Scorsese is saying I think broad generalizations is a bad way to address art.

However, this puts Marvel in a weird spot. Marvel, for years has been the studio that is single handedly keeping theatres alive and well. They have made multiple billion dollar films that have brought audiences out to see the films on the big screen. As someone who wants to keep the big screen experience alive - we must not forget the blessing Marvel has been helping keep theatres in business. But as a result, we have gotten a more homogenized series of blockbuster movies that come out and are less than inspired, trying to catch on to the story building that Marvel does, also the Marvel films themselves have started to feel less than inspired.

A lot of the Marvel films of late have felt like cable television shows vs pieces of cinema. Movies that just help set up future installments and throw characters on screen for the sake of an applause break. It’s started to feel tired, these moments stopped feeling earned. Last year, I sat through Deadpool and Wolverine kinda annoyed by it. Was this what these movies were going to become? Just cheap cameo shows where you can laugh when they reference something you recognize? Isn’t this just a two hundred million dollar version of Big Bang Theory? This is a lot of context to set up my relationship with The Marvel movies- after the excellent Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, I simply stopped having much investment in this series. Sitting through movies like Captain America Brave New World and The Marvels was nothing short of a chore for me. However, Thunderbolts claimed it would be more artistically sound. Trailers promoted them having talent in this movie from A24 films, like the writer and director from the show Beef Jake Schrieder and the cinematographer of The Green Knight Andrew Droz Palermo. While this peaked my interest, I tried to not have it sway my opinions too much. I am afraid that Thunderbolts may suffer from going into the film with the wrong expectations. This is a Marvel film after all, I doubt they were going to go in the direction someone like David Lowery might- as cool as that would be.

So how is the movie itself? It’s good, really good actually. It’s nice to walk out of a Marvel film with a feeling of elation instead of a feeling of deflation these movies have been bringing me lately. I will say, if you are wanting this movie to be an elevated superhero movie, an arthouse comic book film, you will be disappointed by the final result. This movie is in it’s DNA a Marvel movie, but atlas it was a Marvel movie where I was actually invested in the characters and was genuinely moved by their pathos and I can’t name another Marvel movie in recent memory outside of the Guardians franchise where I empathized with the characters this much.

The story is about a bunch of the D-list antiheroes having to face their own inner demons and come together as a team to face off against an incredible threat. That is keeping it vague, because the film is able to have a few surprises along the way I don’t want to spoil. A lot of people have claimed that this movie is Marvel making their own Suicide Squad, and in a certain way you could interpret it that way. However, there is something a lot more tender about this team of heroes. They are more the ‘Sad Squad’ than the Suicide Squad and a big theme of the film is sometimes someone just needs a hug more than a lecture. While that sounds like a sappy cat poster you would see a youth minister post on their Facebook timeline, they way it is conveyed in this movie is effective.

This movie has a lot of heart and that is what makes it so special. So many of these Marvel movies consist of me feeling like I’m staring at a blank wall towards the last act because wow these super powered beings are fighting some more super powered beings and destroying everything in their path. These movies have had a lack of urgency to them because you know that these cluttered action spectacles will conclude with the hero saving the day. Here, the stakes are a lot more personal and introspective. The last third of this movie becomes cerebral and heady in a way that I really appreciated. The way the third act of this movie isn’t based around fighting but based around finding empathy and compassion even in the worst of times is such a refreshing change of pace.

The ultimate third act set piece I also thought was visually inspired. It wasn’t just cluttered explosions on a screen that’s hard to keep track of. The set pieces themselves are actually pretty easy to follow, making them all the more effective and haunting.

Overall, the film is carried by two great performances by Florence Pugh who cements herself as an action star here and Lewis Pullman who plays the character Bob. At first, it seems like Bob is a simple and effective Marvel gag character who ends up being a lot more impactful as the film progresses and we understand who he is in the universe. I found his characters arc in particular to be really challenging and something important to portray on screen. I think the openness of the characters and their struggles with mental health and finding a sense of belonging will resonate with a group of people who struggle with these feelings and knowing they aren’t alone. That alone is powerful and makes me admire this movie so much. This movie actually lets it’s characters breathe and say how they feel and don’t undermine every moment of poignancy with a joke. The humor in this movie feels so natural and organic to these people and who they are. I didn’t feel like I was in a bad improv show like I do with a lot of the other Marvel movies.

The cinematography and choreography of this film are wonderful. While this movie still has a muted color palette of mostly grays, the cinematography is so crisp and nice and the framing is so well done that I actually thought the shots were striking. The opening fight scene in a Hallway had really inventive shot compositions and I already knew this would be better than the last Captain America movie where everything felt like typical shot reverse shot set ups. It’s nice to see a Marvel movie put thought and care into the aesthetics of the film again and not just focus on making it the biggest spectacle they have.

I don’t want to overhype Thunderbolts too much. I don’t think it’s a perfect film. I think the motivation to bring the Thunderbolts together in the first place feels a little underdeveloped. I think the film could have explored it’s themes about mental health even more than they did. Some of the set pieces go on for a little too long. In all honesty, I enjoyed the first two thirds of this movie but they felt very cookie cutter Marvel. This movie still goes through your typical Marvel formula, it’s just this time I cared about the characters and resonated with what the film was saying. It was this formula done well. I will say that the last third of this movie is what really made it special to me. I thought it was such a unique third act set piece that put focus on character instead of action and the way it was conveyed was a little more unconventional than previous Marvel films. Would I say this is an A24 type film like the marketing suggested? No. Is it more artistically minded and poignant than 90% of the Marvel canon of films? Yes, I would say so and that is a breath of fresh air. I had a lot of fun from this movie and took something away from it on an emotional level and that’s a double whammy. This is a great start to the summer movie season.

Sinners, the newest film from Ryan Coogler, director of previous films including Creed and Black Panther stars regular collaborator Michael B. Jordan who plays twin brothers Smoke and Stack- they are trying to leave their sinful lives behind and create a new life for themselves. However, there is an evil lurking in these mens life as they continue to act up, being deceitful and ruthless in trying to create a new music bar that their community can enjoy. That is until this evil presence manifests its way in an unexpected but supernatural way.

That is all I will give away about the film. You probably already know that Sinners is a horror movie and that there is a supernatural twist involved. I find that to be unfortunate because the movie is really effective on creating a slow burn while watching- making the twist of the movie all the more affecting and absorbing. Sinners is a movie that could only be made by a filmmaker at the top of his game with all the power and creative influence he can get. Ryan Coogler, after creating the Black Panther films that went on to create so much acclaim and money- can do anything he wants in Hollywood. This being his blank check movie is one of the best cashed checks in recent movie memory.

One of the best aspects of Sinners is how inherently untraditional it is as a horror movie. This movie feels like it has a lot more arthouse sensibilities attached to it. This script is something I could see easily being picked up by a more independently minded studio like A24- so a major movie studio picking up a movie with this type of pacing is an ambitious undertaking. This is a major win for Warner Bros, who’s taken a lot of losses lately with terrible leadership decisions by CEO David Zagslov. A broken clock is right twice a day.

Sinners is a movie that takes its time to get going and it is so refreshing to see. The set up to this movie takes a long time, the central set piece is a bar area Smoke and Stash run for their brothers and sisters to come together and play music, drink and make love. This set piece isn’t introduced until an hour into the movie. This movie starts with us following several characters we see at the bar later, establishing their role in their community and their relationship to the twin brothers. This makes it all the more effective when their life is in peril in the second half. In a lot of ways, Coogler paces this film much like Tarantino did with his film The Hateful Eight. We get so much set up- so that slow burn payoff rings true and hits hard. Thankfully, the set up is anything but a slog. This movie boasts a really sharp screenplay with distinct and personable characters. The film also has a lot of flawed characters- the characters we follow aren’t cookie cutter or clean whatsoever, but the film justifies wanting to see them get a happy ending.

A boy follows Smoke and Stash to their barn to play music who they simply call ‘preacher boy’. Miles Caton plays preacher boy in his first ever film role and he is incredible in the film. He plays as the audience conduit as he sees the seedy world these characters inhabit. At the start of the film, his father warns him, “if you keep following the devil, he’s gonna follow you home,” which is the overarching theme of this entire film. The film does a great job of showing the deprivation of man, but the human aspect of it as well. We are tempted to indulge in pleasures of the world because it looks fun and feels good- but these simple satisfactions, malice hides in plain sight.

The film’s central theme is simply that we all are in our own ways, monster leeching on the blood of others (in a metaphorical sense or in this case a literal sense as well) for our own satisfaction. How at the end of the day, it’s easier to hurt others to make us feel alive, living is a struggle of a power inbalance. The only way to find peace is through love and vulnerability- something we all can easily hide from due to our own demons.

Coogler is able to make this thoughtful film about religion, classism and self actualization in an easily digestible way. Yet, his commercial appeal never compromises his artistic sensibilities. He is able to do both seamlessly. This movie has some of the most gorgeous cinematography and production design I’ve seen so far this year. The shot composition is so unique and challenging- including one take featuring an assortment of music that made my jaw drop. This movie feels so lived in. I love the music in the film as well, which is an incredible mix and blend of genre that becomes it’s own character throughout the movie. The blues and country elements presented in each scene felt nostalgic to be as someone who grew up in the midwest. This movie has an incredible cast full of memorable performances including Delroy Lindo, a man who brings humor and levity to every scene without compromising the tone or tension of a sequence.

Sinners is a revelation, the word of mouth is spreading like wildfire around this movie and there’s a good reason why. Sinners should be a shining example to the Hollywood system that original storytelling will make people excited to rush to the theatre. This movie is a light in a dismal time to get cool ideas made. In the recent Apple TV series The Studio, it shows how hard it is to get good art made in a system that is commercial to a fault. Coogler comes in and shows how you can engage an audience, incite them to see your movie and still convey the messages you want the audiences to hear. This movie is a miracle and I would implore you to see it if you haven’t already, it’ll go down as one of the years best films and it’s certainly one of my favorites of the year so far.

Brett and Jared discuss the newest Pixar series Win or Lose, currently streaming on Disney Plus and how it's multiple perspectives promote radical empathy in an era when we desperately need it.