October was a wild and crazy month in terms of movies, like, really wild and crazy. In a good way, though. Well, mostly–I did go to a fan screening of Crossroads.
Not all of the movies I saw got reviewed, though, because there just wasn’t room, but I wish there had been because one of them was Back To the Future and it was AWESOME. I’ve seen that movie so many times, but on a big screen it hits differently, and there are details that just aren’t as apparent on home screens, like Pepsi going a bit crazy with the product placement, or the Clothestime store in the background when Marty runs back to the mall at the end of the movie.
I used to shop at Clothestime in junior high and high school. It was a great store.
Anyway, just like last month there’s not much question which movies made October’s Top Five, so it was naturally hard to rank them. And there are a couple of paid subscriber posts in here as well, but obviously honesty dictates they need to be part of the list.
There’s also a very subtle theme here with some of the movies. I don’t know why this keeps happening, but I’m here for it.
All right, here we go (click on the images for the reviews)…
The Mystery of Britannic
Britannic was Titanic‘s younger and supposedly wiser sister. All of the safety issues that were on Titanic were supposedly ironed out and like Titanic the luxury factor was still off the charts. Yet Britannic sank in 1916 due to an onboard explosion, the cause of which is still a mystery today. The Mystery of Britannic not only goes into the history of the wreck, but undersea explorer Richard Kohler takes us on a dive to the wreck.
A Very Good Girl
I was the only non-Asian at my screening of the Filipino film, A Very Good Girl, which is about Mercy, a hapless peon of a woman who gets fired for no reason by her super-fastidous boss, Molly, also known as Mother. Mercy decides to get close to Molly, get as much dirt on her as she can, take down as many of her inner circle as she can, and finally ruin Molly. It’s not easy because Molly is almost like a cult leader, but Mercy is persistent. It’s a very interesting film with terrific performances by the two leads, although it’s definitely not for everyone.
The Creator
The highly-anticipated film from Rogue One veteran Gareth Edwards, The Creator follows Joshua, who is supposed to find something called Nimrata, an AI that controls everything and can destroy the world if it so chooses. While George Lucas had nothing to do with this movie, we can still see shades of Star Wars here, but not too much. The visuals are incredible, and John David Washington as Joshua gives an amazing, nuanced turn. Granted, it does have a few weak spots and fumbles, but it’s still a very enjoyable film that deserves to be seen again.
Stop Making Sense
The classic 1983 Talking Heads Concert film came back to theaters for a short time after a pristine new restoration. I was only a nominal Talking Heads fan prior to seeing Stop Making Sense, but it only took me a few songs to get hooked. Watching a live show on a movie screen messes with the head, though–I had to stop myself from applauding several times. If anyone has a chance to see Stop Making Sense, it’s such a treat.
Killers of the Flower Moon
We wind up with Martin Scorsese’s new tour-de-force about the Osage Murders. It’s really hard to sum up a film like this in a few words, but suffice it to say that it’s at once hard to watch and impossible not to. Leonardo Di Caprio and Robert DeNiro put in incredible performances as Bill Hale and his nephew, Ernest Burkhart, but the highlight for me was Lily Gladstone, who plays Ernest’s wife, Molly.
There’s so much she does with this part with little to no dialogue, such as one scene in a graveyard in which Molly approaches Ernest, and all she does is put her hand on his cheek and after a long beat walk away. The thought immediately came to me that Molly didn’t trust Ernest anymore. It’s a brief scene but it conveys a lot. I know this example probably makes no sense sans context, but it’s illustrative of Gladstone’s MO in the film. To paraphrase a quote often incorrectly attributed to St. Francis of Assisi, “Tell a story; if necessary, use words.”
What movies have you seen this month? Have you seen these? What did you think? Leave a comment below! Thanks for reading, all, and I’ll see you on November 13th. It’s going to be a busy month, and I need a little breather before it starts. You all know. Anyway, have a good one…
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