Watching
My last 10 watched from Letterboxd.
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Tombstone
Only Val Kilmer could make tuberculosis look cool.
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Havoc
On paper, a movie by the director of The Raid starring Tom Hardy sounds great but, sadly, the execution is lacking here. Outside of a couple fun set pieces, this is a pretty nondescript crime movie. Even the setting is some unknown, presumably American (based on the sheer number of guns) city, which looks like a combination of back lot sets and something made in Unreal Engine. This movie also has Timothy Olyphant, Forest Whitaker and Luis Guzman but pretty much squanders them. I really dug Apostle and Gangs of London, so I’m not sure what happened here but it’s not good.
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My Old Ass
Man, the hug just guts me every time.
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Ash
Visually interesting but kind of a slog to get through. Goes to great lengths to set up a mystery that, when it’s finally revealed, is like, “oh, okay.”
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Sinners
Watched on Monday April 21, 2025.
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Jack Reacher: Never Go Back
Wow, I heard this was bad and put it off this long. Cruise is really slumming it here in what looks like a made for TV movie. There’s entire seasons of Amazon’s Reacher that are better than this. The fight scenes are pretty poorly shot and choreographed, especially in a post-John Wick world. And if Cruise did his own stunts, you wouldn’t know it. But Cruise is still Cruise and never fails to win me over, even in dreck like this. Plus I’ve had a crush on Cobie Smulders since her How I Met Your Mother days. Overall, pretty inoffensive but doesn’t reach the highs of the first film and it’s hard not to think of Alan Ritchson as Reacher now.
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Blue Velvet
Hoo! They don’t make ‘em like this anymore!
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The Lighthouse
Having seen Eggers’ last two movies since this was released, The Lighthouse has lost a little bit of its luster. Still a great two-hander with brilliant performances by Dafoe and Pattinson, but it drags on a bit at times. The 4K release doesn’t do it any favors either, since much of the film is shot in low light with shallow depth of field. Man, that ending though.
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A Minecraft Movie
Video game movies are tricky because you have a checklist of things from the game you have to squeeze in references to for the fans but you also have to find a a way to make it fun for the uninitiated. Jared Hess may be the perfect director to deliver seemingly non sequiturs in a fun way. There’s definitely some Napoleon Dynamite DNA here. Jack Black is in full Jack Black mode and shares a Point Break-esque homoerotic bond with a similarly over-the-top Jason Momoa. This checked all the boxes for my Minecraft-loving 6-year-old but also had me cracking up a lot more than I thought I would.
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Unforgiven
Most of this movie is fine but the last 20 minutes or so are incredible. So many great lines and seeing Eastwood become the legend that was alluded to for most of the movie is sublime. Hackman really shines here as the villainous sheriff who talks a good game but turns out to be about as good a sheriff as he is a carpenter.