2026 Movie Discussion Thread

[Curt McGirt]

I'm 42. Could have just been where we lived. I mean there were videos at gas stations in some of the places we moved around to (we were nomadic for a period of time before settling). 

[driver]

I'm 56 and worked PT in a video store(shot out Quick Video. RIP) for a few months in '98/'99. Minimum wage, but a fun, but after some weirdness I dipped the fuck out and haven't worked a second job since.

 

Edited May 8 by driver

[J.H.]

NYC had Champagne Video. New releases, old favorites and quite the well stocked porn section

James

[Andrew POE!]

Movies today....

Mortal Kombat (2021) (HBO Max) - 2.5/5 stars

Spoiler

Marvel Cinematic Universe has both helped and hurt movies. Live action movies based on comic books, video games, and animation now have something that's required to be built in - everything has a more 'serious' look to it, but there's also humorous quips and aspects for the fans that remember everything. The movies then become 'key jingling' as it attempts to tell its story.

Mortal Kombat (2021) is guilty of this, but it actually does a few things better than the previous iterations. With this, more care has been put into the visuals and production design. It looks like a high quality movie - the opening scenes with Bi-Han/Sub Zero (Joe Taslim) finding and killing Hanzo Hasahi/Scorpion (Hiroyuki Sanada) has a gravitas to it that the 1995 version and definitely Annihilation couldn't find.

The movie establishes that the "Mortal Kombat tournament" has an importance to the story. Jax (Mehcad Brooks) is to find Cole Young (Lewis Tan) after a MMA fight because of Young baring a 'mark' that makes him the fighter for Earthrealm. It throws characters and meaning out onto the screen, but it's more controlled versus Annihilation. It makes the movie seem a bit too 'self-serious' at points. Sonya Blade (Jessica McNamee) can't fight in the tournament, but Kano (Josh Lawson) can.

Raiden (Tadanobu Asano) is portrayed as more of an aloof character compared to the earlier versions; in a way, he's almost a flat character and is a way for the 'hero characters' to come together to fight against Shang Tsung (Chin Han) and his minions Mileena (Sisi Stringer), Reiko (Nathan Jones), Kabal (Daniel Nelson), Sub-Zero, and Goro (Angus Sampson).

(It's a shame that Goro got killed off before he even fought in the tournament)

Going back to MCU, this movie seems like a 'sequel bait' into the next movie. So the story feels very much like a 'first act' rather than anything with a complete story. What is the character arc in this is the fact that Cole Young unlocks his powers during the fight with Goro. He helps Scorpion fight Sub-Zero in a climatic battle. Yet, the battles aren't over as Shang Tsung tells Raiden he'll be bringing an army against him and his warriors from Earthrealm.

Mortal Kombat (2021) visually is a lot better, but at times cinematography wise it feels a bit like those YA movies like The Hunger Games or Harry Potter and indeed the Marvel movies than a serious adult drama.

Still, it certainly is better than Mortal Kombat Annihilation.

Lilies (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 4/5 stars

Spoiler

To be honest, the movie is intriguing to watch although a bit difficult to track at times. Lilies is James Ivory's Maurice, Jean Genet's Un chant d'amour, and Derek Jarman's The Tempest all shoved in together and blended. What happens is Simon Doucet (Aubert Pallascio) forcing Bishop Jean Bilodeau (Marcel Sabourin) to remember their pasts together.

What's interesting is how the movie plays with gender roles; it's much like what The Cockettes would do, except made more seriously. Countess de Tilly (Brent Carver) is in drag, but within the story it's acceptable for the person to be presented as a woman. The play that Simon and Jean witness floats through like a dream and is shown to be more imaginary than the prison auditorium. The movie jumps between the actual location and the imagined location easily, with one scene where a younger Simon (Jason Cadieux) and Vallier (Danny Gilmore) kiss naked in a bath in the prison.

The truth is eventually learned about the murder that Simon was convicted of - Vallier and Simon were trapped in the attic when Jean discovered them. Jean felt responsible for Simon, yet Simon took the fall. In the end, Jean wants Simon to kill him, yet he won't. The movie ends on a shot of Jean holding the knife, possibly about to kill himself with it.

Lilies for the most part is an interesting low-budget film that's intriguing to watch.

All Good Things (Hulu, leaving on 5/10) - 3/5 stars

Spoiler

It's interesting to watch All Good Things in 2026 versus the time it came out in 2010. The movie is really about Robert Durst, but David Marks (Ryan Gosling) is closer to Donald Trump than anyone else. Marks in this isn't a braggart nor as unsophisticated or as unintelligent as Trump is, but he has the same sociopath/psychopath tendencies that Trump does (not to mention the same difficulties with women). The difference is David Marks doesn't want to be part of a real estate corporation that his father Sanford Marks (Frank Langella) runs.

What's interesting with this movie is the fact that it almost sets out like a conventional romantic drama where David Marks meets Katie McCarthy (Kirsten Dunst) at her apartment to fix a plumbing issue. David's desire to see Katie is an effort to hide who he really is and what his family really does - the real estate company that David Marks ends up doing work for involves him going to seedy businesses to collect money.

All Good Things' cinematography is the highlight for this movie; a lot of the shots are evocative of the timeframe, with a lot of dark lighting and blue hues in the coloring. The movie at times drags a bit and some of the acting seems a bit inert. It's difficult to find excitement in what the characters are doing, even with people like Nick Offerman showing up as a neighbor.

Katie's disappearance seems completely sudden; it's almost purposely misleading that David Marks had to do with the disappearance. It's implied that Deborah Lehrman (Lily Rabe) had a part in the disappearance when Katie was seen at a phone booth before getting into a taxi. Deborah's killing done by Malvern Bump (Philip Baker Hall) is directed by David to allow for culpable denial. The scene towards the end where David has one last visit with his father had me thinking he said "I miss you so much" (meaning, he misses his father being alert and walking around) than his saying "I miss her so much."

For the most part, All Good Things as a movie is an interesting crime drama with decent performances from Dunst and Gosling.

Mortal Kombat II (saw in the theaters) - 3.5/5 stars

Spoiler

It's probably fair to say that Mortal Kombat II is the best Mortal Kombat movie ever done. No, the story isn't deep. The characters aren't deep either. It might be a bit 'fan service'-y at times; but it's one of the more enjoyable movie theater experiences in awhile.

It's rather telling that the movie has Kitana (Sophia Xu) witness her father Jerrod (Desmond Chiam) killed during a fight with Shao Kahn (Martyn Ford). Shao Kahn in this is more fearsome and bigger than the one in Annihilation. For a moment, I thought they had gotten Ralph Ineson to play Shao Kahn with some of the whiskey soaked voice Ford had. Kitana is then made to be Shao Kahn's 'daughter' and has a somewhat romantic relationship with Jade (Tati Gabrielle). (Which it being a R-rated movie designed for teenagers and video game playing adults, apparently same sex coupling isn't a thing anymore). The movie depicts them as friends and....that's it.

The other focus is the character that has appeared in most of the trailers Johnny Cage (Karl Urban). His introductory scenes feels like something out of late 1990s low budget action movies that managed to sell tons of tickets during the time - the fight scene set to "Rock You Like A Hurricane" is a great moment. What seems to be happening (although a bit abbreviated) is Johnny Cage realizing he has more to life than being about himself. He can fight for Earth and help Raiden (Tadanobu Asano), Sonya Blade (Jessica McNamee), Jax (Mehcad Brooks), Liu Kang (Ludi Lin), and Cole Young (Lewis Tan) be fighters in the tournament.

The movie gets into gear with the tournament and the story really takes a backseat. It essentially has the 'heroes' fighting one on one against Shao Kahn's forces - the story mechanism has been around since Bruce Lee's Enter The Dragon and Shaw Brothers' 5 Fingers of Death. Some of the fights has them showing mercy - like Kitana and Johnny Cage's fight and Jax's fight with Jade. Others lead to death when Sonya Blade fights Sindel (Ana Thu Nguyen).

Shao Kahn fights Cole Young and kills him, which renders the entirety of the first movie completely pointless. If you're going to introduce a fucking character and has an entire movie built around his unlocking his powers AND fighting for his family, then have him survive to the end of the movie!!! I actually came close to walking out of the theater with that. It made the story arc lesser for this movie and really made the story arc for the first movie even more so.

Like the first movie, Mortal Kombat II is a bit "MCU"-ized. Liu Kang and Kung Lao (Max Huang)'s fight managed to borrow from Captain America and Iron Man's fight in Captain America: Civil War as Kang's fire hit Lao's metal hat. Kano (Josh Lawson) appears and does even more hilarious self-aware quips like calling Quan Chi (Damon Herriman) "Voldemort" and Johnny Cage looks at the amulet to quote Lord of the Rings "one ring to rule them all." Johnny Cage's fight with Baraka (CJ Bloomfield) had a Mad Max/Borderlands quality to it until Cage defeats Baraka (and they manage to do the Predator bicep pose handshake at the end too).

The last 20 minutes or so is like the climaxes in MCU movies where Kano/Cage/Scorpion (Hiroyuki Sanada) are fighting Bi Han (Joe Taslim) at the same time as Shao Kahn and Kitana fight and Raiden is about to get killed by Shang Tsung (Chin Han). (BTW, I was surprised that Sanada and Taslim spoke in English and not Japanese like the first movie...gotta be consistent). Kitana wins and kills Shao Kahn and is now queen of Edenia.

I really loved the match cuts that were used when it was going between Johnny and Kitana in the climax sequence (Johnny lying on the ground, then cutting to Kitana on the ground).

The ending leads to a sequel, but this ending felt more satisfying too. The story threads for this were better resolved, even though the heroes are walking coolly away towards resurrecting people.

No, Mortal Kombat II isn't the best movie of the year, but it's a great movie to see in the theaters.

Serena (Hulu, leaving on 5/10) - 1.5/5 stars

Spoiler

It can be said that Lynne Ramsay's Die My Love is a more realized version of the story attempted with Serena. As a movie, Serena should have been really great - Bradley Cooper as George Pemberton and Jennifer Lawrence as Serena Pemberton are game to the material and willing to prove themselves in the role. Susanna Bier as a director has an unique approach and has the movie be a bit realistic with its character drama. Cinematographer Morten Soborg is able to show absolutely gorgeous scenery with his shots and really great interior photograph for the buildings and rooms.

So what exactly happened with this movie?

It seems that the story just didn't have any dramatic impetus. Oftentimes, while watching this, I was left to feel that the characters (even beyond Lawrence and Cooper's characters) just didn't have any reason for being there, much less a reaction. It's a well-filmed movie, but the story threads introduced left me feeling cold.

The closest was in the scenes where a character loses his hand in a grisly accident and Serena suffers a miscarriage shortly after that. Those scenes never build up beyond that - the character that lost his hand named Galloway (Rhys Ifans) feels 'obligated' to help Serena based on something his mother told him as a 'prophecy.' Why? We never learn. It leads to Galloway killing Campbell (Sean Harris) because Campbell got a hold of the ledgers. A lot of the scenes in the movie were like this - "A must occur so that B can too and so it can lead to C."

Which makes a lot of the subplots, like the national park subplot and George having a child with another woman that has arrived, seem inconsequential. The movie turns into beautifully photographed wallpaper, not a movie with dramatic weight and heft. It tries to be an 'arthouse movie,' but really lacks what makes arthouse movies truly great.

 

[zendragon]

3 hours ago, J.H. said:

NYC had Champagne Video. New releases, old favorites and quite the well stocked porn section

James

twenty years ago I remember some womans blog about working in a video store that was something like half porn going wild. People can be gross lets just say.

 

7 hours ago, Curt McGirt said:

I'm 42. Could have just been where we lived. I mean there were videos at gas stations in some of the places we moved around to (we were nomadic for a period of time before settling). 

Feels like if you lived out in the sticks you got more of the mom and pop variety 

[zendragon]

Yhea about that Jade/Kitana relationship when Jade says "Princess are supposed to sit on pillows fanning themselves, you your not a pillow princess" Am supposed to assume they are roommates? Gal Pals?

[Curt McGirt]

The Ebert site reviewer that gave 2 1/2 to Mortal Kombat II kind of dissed it while also giving backhanded praise to Annihilation which was a total WTF from me. Like... what? You liked that? 

Family Video even had the legendary BACK ROOM HORROR SECTION with stand-ups and posters on the wall. It was tight as fuck. 

[Technico Support]

Re: memories of video stores, Matt McCarthy (actor, comedian, former WWE writer) has an excellent monthly 3 hour pod called VHS Tapes Are Magic that covers physical media, video stores, etc and frequently interviews people who run current physical media stores.  It’s only maybe 3-4 episodes in and it’s a fun listen.

[J.H.]

New York City is a treacherous hive if scum and villainy and home ro Manhattan Video, run by a guy named Dick who was one of Plato's Retreat regulars. I worked for messenger service that was right next door. They soldalmost exclusively porn. The number of guys who I worked with that rented from Dick was truly scary.

But who am I to judge. I went to Show World to watch Nina Hartley dance 

James 

Edited May 19 by J.H.

[Curt McGirt]

Whew, that's like, the era when porn was still mobbed up. Mr. Plato's Retreat must've been paying back then. 

[J.H.]

Mr. Plato's Retreat even had a public access show on the same channel that had Al Goldtein's Midnight Blue and Robin Byrd. It was called. "In & Out with Dick". While I do adore Al Goldtein and have mad respect Ms. Byrd, Dick looked exactly like a white guy who ran a porn store in in midtown Manhattan would look like!

James

 

[elizium]

7 hours ago, J.H. said:

But who am I to judge. I went to Show World to watch Nina Hartley dance 

Everyone likes to think about what they would do and where they would go if they had a time machine, but if I'm being honest with myself, I would go to gritty 70s/80s NYC and try to pick up Sharon Mitchell

[Andrew POE!]

22 minutes ago, elizium said:

Everyone likes to think about what they would do and where they would go if they had a time machine, but if I'm being honest with myself, I would go to gritty 70s/80s NYC and try to pick up Sharon Mitchell

I would go back to 1970s/1980s NYC to try to audition for an Abel Ferrara movie. King of New York, Fear City China Girl, The Addiction, Driller Killer, Ms. 45, Bad Lieutenant, any of them. 

[elizium]

Just now, Andrew POE! said:

I would go back to 1970s/1980s NYC to try to audition for an Abel Ferrara movie. King of New York, Fear City China Girl, The Addiction, Driller Killer, Ms. 45, Bad Lieutenant, any of them. 

To be murdered by Ms. 45, the dream

[J.H.]

I think it was 93 when I saw Nina. She and I talked for a little bit and I confessed my Fandom began when Al Goldstein interviewed her for Midnight Blue. She was shocked " Oh my god! I did that interview in 86! You are a fan!"

She is really nice and loves her fans

James

Edited May 11 by J.H.

[Andrew POE!]

Movies today...

Tokyo Pop (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 4/5 stars

Spoiler

To be honest, Tokyo Pop really doesn't have a story; it's almost a 'tourist-y' take on Tokyo and could be seen as a precursor to Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation. Wendy Reed (Carrie Hamilton) ditches NYC punk scene to go to Tokyo because of a girlfriend that is living there. When she gets there, the girlfriend left and went to Bangkok. She experiences loneliness and isolation on account of being a foreigner in a country where she doesn't speak the language. She meets Hiro (Yutaka Tadokoro), who fronts a band that's trying to get noticed and they sing American rock and roll (the start of the movie has his band playing "Blue Suede Shoes").

A lot of the movie is carried through the visuals and the 'lived in' locations that the characters pass through. The camera always focuses on Wendy in a crowd of people, her blonde hair standing out against a sea of normality. I really liked the scene where Hiro and Wendy are on a pier and talking; they walk towards the camera as the shot turns into a midrange closeup from a wide angle shot. What's interesting is that making big in Japan is just as hard as becoming famous in America, even with the attraction of being a foreigner in the country. Wendy at first has to deal with a misconception about Americans and has to sing "Home on the Range" at a hostess bar where she works - the thought is that Americans like country music, even though there's more to music than that. Wendy and Hiro end up in magazines, Fuji TV shows, and the band records "Do You Believe In Magic?" that becomes a hit in Japan. Wendy walks into the office of Dota (Tetsuro Tamba) and gives him the band's demo.

Eventually, Wendy decides to leave Tokyo back for America; she encourages Hiro and his band to sing their own song, not "Do You Believe In Magic?" again. She goes back to America and records a single as the movie ends.

If you look out for it, there's a commercial for Famicom Disk System and Pro Wrestling. There's also footage from All Japan Women's Pro Wrestling; Bull Nakano, Mimi Shimoda, and other female wrestlers appear in a locker room scene as Wendy barges out because of the frustration with Dota's practices. Also, Carrie Hamilton is the daughter of Carol Burnett, who help provide funding for the movie. Hamilton and Burnett wrote a play I recently acted in called Hollywood Arms.

Tokyo Pop won't reinvent these types of movies - Roman Holiday did it - but it's not a bad effort.

Behind Convent Walls (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 2.5/5 stars

Spoiler

There's not really a story to this, but whatever. The story that's there is these women, including Clara (Ligia Branice) and Veronica (Marina Pierro), wants to be able to enjoy life, play a violin and dance around but their Mother Superior is all "No Fun Allowed" because they are nuns. They took a vow to be obedient to God (and to her).

It starts hitting the fan soon after that. The moral of the story is if you're a nun, don't masturbate with a dildo you found falling out of the sky, don't get boned by a dude named Rodrigo (Howard Ross) who is a relative of a priest, and don't have fun because it'll give the Mother Superior a heart attack and kill her. You'll get killed too. You hear that? No boning, no masturbating with candles, no fun.

I mean, you could do what Alucarda and Benedetta did and do it with another sister in the convent, that's perfectly fine. Just no dudes because dudes are evil and hairy.

The movie is boring as shit at times, but worth it for the dance sequence and the sequence where Clara and Rodrigo have sex.

Blue Heron (saw in the theaters) - 5/5 stars

Spoiler

Growing up, I was a lot like Jeremy (Edik Beddoes).

I even looked the same - longish blonde/brunette hair, glasses, extremely shy, and extremely awkward around people. Most of my high school years was spent in my room. I can't ever recall having someone over at my house during high school, much carrying on a conversation with someone during high school about outside interests. The town I grew up in was relentlessly mean with mean people.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Jeremy.

The differences between myself and Jeremy end with what he does (or said to have done) in Blue Heron. Jeremy is completely different and isolated from his family, Hungarian immigrants coming to Vancouver. The mother (Iringo Reti) and father (Oscar Isaacs looking Adam Tompa) have three children that look more like them than they do Jeremy - Henry (Liam Serg), Felix (Preston Drabble), and the audience's entry point Sasha (Eylul Guven). The movie starts with a woman holding an iPhone and taking a picture of houses in suburbia. The voice does a narration as she recounts not really remembering or understanding what she tried to keep hidden from her childhood and about Jeremy. The woman talking is later learned to be the adult Sasha (Amy Zimmer).

What Sophy Romvari does with Blue Heron is not really give the audience 'clues' as to the story. But it's easy to guess from watching it. The father is a photographer or a filmmaker of some sort; the mother is a homemaker. Sasha has a bit of difficulty being accepted into the mostly white, mostly English speaking neighborhood; she plays hide and seek with neighborhood kids and finds herself in a swimming pool. She comes back and finds Jeremy laying on the steps, playing as though he is 'dead.' The parents seem to shrug at his behavior.

The parents seem to regard Jeremy's difficulties much like Jeff Daniels' character in The Squid & The Whale regarded any professional help; there's something wrong with the professional help. Whereas Jeff Daniels' character was abusive, the parents in Blue Heron seem at a loss as to what to do with Jeremy. They just know that the counselor is an asshole for his poor advice that doesn't understand the situation.

Even then, Jeremy gets much worse, much more disconnected from his family. He walks on the roof of the house, threatening to jump. He is arrested for shoplifting as Sasha watches. The father yells at Jeremy in his basement room, with maps of the streets near them. No matter what is to be done, there's nothing to help Jeremy. It reminded me of Marco Bellocchio's documentary Marx Can Wait, where it was revealed that his 1980 movie A Leap in the Dark was about his brother. His brother turns out to have similar mental health issues that the family felt powerless to stop or help.

One scene that I liked that was pure cinematic synchronicity was King Crimson's "I Talk To The Wind" playing while Sasha and the mother peel potatoes a la Chantal Akerman style. The scene lingers on the peeling, but the music seems to personify Jeremy - he talks to the wind, but the wind does not hear. They cook the potato pancakes and it seems appropo for Jeremy to be walking around the roof. The pancakes burn while the mother and father try to talk him down.

At some point, the movie goes back to the present as an adult Sasha is talking to her mother on speakerphone through her iPhone. There is no marker to indicate the present, but the way the scenes in present are filmed appear a bit different. The 1995 scenes (with a Super Nintendo under the TV and Paul Simon MP3s on dad's computer) looks to be using film stock while present day uses digital cameras.

In the present, adult Sasha is a filmmaker interviewing people about a documentary that she is doing. She is asking them about a 'case' where the person turns out to resemble Jeremy. The person in the case dreams of being 'rich and famous' and shoplifted twice. In some respects in those moments and comparing them to what happened previously, Also, the person in the 'case' had gasoline in his room with the intentions of burning down the house - Jeremy turned out to had gasoline too. Blue Heron somewhat resembles Aftersun. The documentary style also resembles Abbas Kiarostami/Jafar Panahi's melding of fiction and documentary that appears in their movies (once again as a reminder to me, I need to watch Kiarostami's work). It's a bit more concrete in its themes and its connection between past and present, but the feelings invoked are still the same. Sasha after interviewing people, cries in her apartment.

Towards the end, adult Sasha 'travels back in time' to relive her memories, but as the social worker visiting Sasha's parents. It could be thought that possibly what Sasha is experiencing in her life was different and this is a present day family that resembles her own family, her own father, and her own mother. The social worker asks the parents about what happened with Jeremy and what they tried to do. The parents genuinely seem at a loss with how to reach Jeremy; nothing seems to work to help him. The younger Sasha is listening in, calling back to an earlier scene before the cut to present day. The younger Sasha is then shown standing in the doorway, with a different person as the social worker. The adult Sasha had placed herself in both the social worker and in Sasha's shoes.

The adult Sasha imagines herself talking to Jeremy, one last time as they walk near the rocks at the ocean and Jeremy sitting on steps while Sasha reads from her iPhone. It turns out that Jeremy is dead; the email told about a person that tried to look him up on Facebook and recalling Jeremy as a memorable person in high school. The movie loops back around to the start as Sasha is now taking a video of the houses near where she grew up - this time, the camera is on her, and not on the phone taking the video.

One trick that Romvari does is in how shots are framed. She uses doorframes to enclose characters. Mirror shots are used a few times - when young Sasha is looking in the mirror followed by her mother also looking in the mirror. How Jeremy is framed in shots is symbolic; he's shown as solitary in shots, like when he's bouncing a basketball against the house or standing on the roof. Romvari also does a brief homage to Antonioni when adult Sasha is shown standing alone on a ferry.

I think it's easy to say that Blue Heron is the best movie of 2026 so far. Nothing else has come close. This movie demonstrably shows that somewhat painful memories, nostalgia in some respects, and adult maturity can be melded together to create a powerful work.

Killer Nun (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 2.5/5 stars

Spoiler

Although not even connected to it, Killer Nun is a lot better than Behind Convent Walls. In some ways, this is more like a giallo movie with nuns than a 'nunsploitation' movie. Sister Gertrude (Anita Ekberg) doesn't trust her own memory after coming back from the hospital following brain surgery. She smashes up the dentures of a patient and delays getting help for the woman while she is in Dr. Poirret (Massimo Serato)'s care.

The only person that seems to protect Sister Gertrude is Sister Mathieu (Paola Morra), who is frequently nude in the movie. The movie tends to 'spin its wheels' a bit as Gertrude goes through episodes of believing that she murdered a patient with a lamp and getting Dr. Poirret fired for his actions.

Seemingly, when Dr. Roland (Joe Dallesandro) arrives, he knows Sister Mathieu outside of the hospital. Sister Gertrude gets summoned to Mother Superior (Alida Valli)'s office and put into an asylum; at that point, Sister Gertrude realizes that she's innocent and Sister Mathieu committed the murders at the hospital.

The movie uses a lot of POV shots and one murder has a lot of closeups of needles going into a person's face (and her eyelid, eeek!!) that's especially giallo-like. It's just too bad that the movie isn't very compelling to watch until the last 20 minutes or so. The performances are a bit average, although Ekberg is the lone highlight.

Along The Great Divide (HBO Max, leaving on 5/31) - 3.5/5 stars

Spoiler

Along the Great Divide is a bit deceiving. It appears to be a cut and dry 'good guys' / 'bad guys' Western - Marshal Len Merrick (Kirk Douglas) sees vigilante justice is about to take place as Tim Keith (Walter Brennan) is captured and to be hung by Ned Roden (Morris Ankrum) and his posse. Merrick insists upon Keith to be tried in a court of law at another town. He and his deputies Billy Shear (John Agar) and Lou Gray (Ray Teal) take Keith along to carry it out. They end up taking Tim's daughter Ann (Virginia Mayo) too.

The movie becomes a bit more complicated than the tropes and the story mechanism used. Merrick is almost as guilty of egregious behavior as Tim Keith is accused of doing - there's a certain song that he doesn't like being sung since it reminds him of his dad. Merrick's dad was hung as well - which feeds into Merrick's sense of justice and also his desire to not see anyone hung unjustly.

There's also a sense of delirium working against the characters. Merrick and his group run into Roden and his posse again in a shootout that's reminiscent of the finale in Raoul Walsh's other movie High Sierra. Ned's son Dan (James Anderson) is taken captive as Merrick and his group resume their trek towards Santa Lorna. Eventually, the numbers begin to dwindle as the deputies die one by one and the horses flee.

They reach by foot and at this point the movie turns into an abbreviated courtroom drama. Merrick speaks up for Keith despite not really having anything to support him. Keith is found guilty and is to be hung. Merrick finds the watch and realizes that....it's Dan's watch.

To be honest, the conclusion seems a bit rushed as Ned believes Merrick a bit too easily with seeing Dan's watch and the inscription in front of him. Dan and Merrick have a gunfight after Dan kills his dad. Dan ends up dead too.

For the most part with this Western, it's very much a B-movie, but the character arc and complexity is a bit unusual for that. Kirk Douglas around this time also did Ace in the Hole and then The Bad and The Beautiful a year later; so playing a complex character with this movie seems to be in Douglas' wheelhouse.

 

[odessasteps]

While doing the pod today, I got to do a deep on John ford and John wayne, including the cavalry trilogy, the searchers and liberty valence, also, the gene autry movie the cowboys and the Indians, which I reviewed a couple years ago. All due to a digression about RDR1 and Monument Valley.

[HarryArchieGus]

16 hours ago, Andrew POE! said:

Blue Heron (saw in the theaters) - 5/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

Growing up, I was a lot like Jeremy (Edik Beddoes).

I even looked the same - longish blonde/brunette hair, glasses, extremely shy, and extremely awkward around people. Most of my high school years was spent in my room. I can't ever recall having someone over at my house during high school, much carrying on a conversation with someone during high school about outside interests. The town I grew up in was relentlessly mean with mean people.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, Jeremy.

The differences between myself and Jeremy end with what he does (or said to have done) in Blue Heron. Jeremy is completely different and isolated from his family, Hungarian immigrants coming to Vancouver. The mother (Iringo Reti) and father (Oscar Isaacs looking Adam Tompa) have three children that look more like them than they do Jeremy - Henry (Liam Serg), Felix (Preston Drabble), and the audience's entry point Sasha (Eylul Guven). The movie starts with a woman holding an iPhone and taking a picture of houses in suburbia. The voice does a narration as she recounts not really remembering or understanding what she tried to keep hidden from her childhood and about Jeremy. The woman talking is later learned to be the adult Sasha (Amy Zimmer).

What Sophy Romvari does with Blue Heron is not really give the audience 'clues' as to the story. But it's easy to guess from watching it. The father is a photographer or a filmmaker of some sort; the mother is a homemaker. Sasha has a bit of difficulty being accepted into the mostly white, mostly English speaking neighborhood; she plays hide and seek with neighborhood kids and finds herself in a swimming pool. She comes back and finds Jeremy laying on the steps, playing as though he is 'dead.' The parents seem to shrug at his behavior.

The parents seem to regard Jeremy's difficulties much like Jeff Daniels' character in The Squid & The Whale regarded any professional help; there's something wrong with the professional help. Whereas Jeff Daniels' character was abusive, the parents in Blue Heron seem at a loss as to what to do with Jeremy. They just know that the counselor is an asshole for his poor advice that doesn't understand the situation.

Even then, Jeremy gets much worse, much more disconnected from his family. He walks on the roof of the house, threatening to jump. He is arrested for shoplifting as Sasha watches. The father yells at Jeremy in his basement room, with maps of the streets near them. No matter what is to be done, there's nothing to help Jeremy. It reminded me of Marco Bellocchio's documentary Marx Can Wait, where it was revealed that his 1980 movie A Leap in the Dark was about his brother. His brother turns out to have similar mental health issues that the family felt powerless to stop or help.

One scene that I liked that was pure cinematic synchronicity was King Crimson's "I Talk To The Wind" playing while Sasha and the mother peel potatoes a la Chantal Akerman style. The scene lingers on the peeling, but the music seems to personify Jeremy - he talks to the wind, but the wind does not hear. They cook the potato pancakes and it seems appropo for Jeremy to be walking around the roof. The pancakes burn while the mother and father try to talk him down.

At some point, the movie goes back to the present as an adult Sasha is talking to her mother on speakerphone through her iPhone. There is no marker to indicate the present, but the way the scenes in present are filmed appear a bit different. The 1995 scenes (with a Super Nintendo under the TV and Paul Simon MP3s on dad's computer) looks to be using film stock while present day uses digital cameras.

In the present, adult Sasha is a filmmaker interviewing people about a documentary that she is doing. She is asking them about a 'case' where the person turns out to resemble Jeremy. The person in the case dreams of being 'rich and famous' and shoplifted twice. In some respects in those moments and comparing them to what happened previously, Also, the person in the 'case' had gasoline in his room with the intentions of burning down the house - Jeremy turned out to had gasoline too. Blue Heron somewhat resembles Aftersun. The documentary style also resembles Abbas Kiarostami/Jafar Panahi's melding of fiction and documentary that appears in their movies (once again as a reminder to me, I need to watch Kiarostami's work). It's a bit more concrete in its themes and its connection between past and present, but the feelings invoked are still the same. Sasha after interviewing people, cries in her apartment.

Towards the end, adult Sasha 'travels back in time' to relive her memories, but as the social worker visiting Sasha's parents. It could be thought that possibly what Sasha is experiencing in her life was different and this is a present day family that resembles her own family, her own father, and her own mother. The social worker asks the parents about what happened with Jeremy and what they tried to do. The parents genuinely seem at a loss with how to reach Jeremy; nothing seems to work to help him. The younger Sasha is listening in, calling back to an earlier scene before the cut to present day. The younger Sasha is then shown standing in the doorway, with a different person as the social worker. The adult Sasha had placed herself in both the social worker and in Sasha's shoes.

The adult Sasha imagines herself talking to Jeremy, one last time as they walk near the rocks at the ocean and Jeremy sitting on steps while Sasha reads from her iPhone. It turns out that Jeremy is dead; the email told about a person that tried to look him up on Facebook and recalling Jeremy as a memorable person in high school. The movie loops back around to the start as Sasha is now taking a video of the houses near where she grew up - this time, the camera is on her, and not on the phone taking the video.

One trick that Romvari does is in how shots are framed. She uses doorframes to enclose characters. Mirror shots are used a few times - when young Sasha is looking in the mirror followed by her mother also looking in the mirror. How Jeremy is framed in shots is symbolic; he's shown as solitary in shots, like when he's bouncing a basketball against the house or standing on the roof. Romvari also does a brief homage to Antonioni when adult Sasha is shown standing alone on a ferry.

I think it's easy to say that Blue Heron is the best movie of 2026 so far. Nothing else has come close. This movie demonstrably shows that somewhat painful memories, nostalgia in some respects, and adult maturity can be melded together to create a powerful work.

I'm happy to hear you enjoyed this. I've been plotting out my screening. Looked a bit heavy for this weekend. I instead saw to an encore screening of Mile End Kicks. Still thoroughly wonderful. I also finally got to see Richard Linklater's outstanding Nouvelle Vague. I generally avoid biopics when I can, but glad I didn't skip this. They nailed it! Nice style. My preferred Linklater '25 film. It paired nicely with the Friday feature They All Laughed. Still a pretty underrated Peter Bogdonavich film, despite it's famous champions. Colleen Camp often steals the show. Really good late career Audrey Hepburn. Following up on Nouvelle Vague with Truffaut's The Man Who Loved Women tonight. It's on Criterion Channel right now. I'm not picking favourites, but it's amongst my favourite Truffaut. 

I also saw and loved Rocco and His Brothers this past week. A stunning movie. As beautiful as it is horrific at times. This was my first dalliance with the Luchino Visconti catalog. I plan to move onto the Leopard next. 

[Andrew POE!]

3 hours ago, HarryArchieGus said:

I'm happy to hear you enjoyed this. I've been plotting out my screening. Looked a bit heavy for this weekend. I instead saw to an encore screening of Mile End Kicks. Still thoroughly wonderful. I also finally got to see Richard Linklater's outstanding Nouvelle Vague. I generally avoid biopics when I can, but glad I didn't skip this. They nailed it! Nice style. My preferred Linklater '25 film. It paired nicely with the Friday feature They All Laughed. Still a pretty underrated Peter Bogdonavich film, despite it's famous champions. Colleen Camp often steals the show. Really good late career Audrey Hepburn. Following up on Nouvelle Vague with Truffaut's The Man Who Loved Women tonight. It's on Criterion Channel right now. I'm not picking favourites, but it's amongst my favourite Truffaut. 

I also saw and loved Rocco and His Brothers this past week. A stunning movie. As beautiful as it is horrific at times. This was my first dalliance with the Luchino Visconti catalog. I plan to move onto the Leopard next. 

Yeah, I'm hoping I didn't overrate Blue Heron, but it really stuck with me. I'm glad you like Mile End Kicks (one of the few times in a chain theater where the movie began right away at start time). 

I saw They All Laughed sometime last month (or maybe the month prior) on HBO Max. Despite the tragedy around the lead actress' death, it's generally a great movie. 

I'll probably watch The Man Who Loved Women (both versions) sooner than later. Same with 1983's Breathless that showed up on Criterion Channel. 

I started on the wrong movies with Visconti - I'm wanting to go in release order like I did with Antonioni. I did watch Zabriskie Point on HBO Max not long ago and gave it five stars. I'm thinking of doing something where I watch Visconti's Obsession before I watch the new movie out this weekend called Obsession. They obviously won't fit thematically but it's a nice experiment. 

[Andrew POE!]

Selected movies today...

Louder Than Bombs (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 3/5 stars

Spoiler

Louder Than Bombs is probably Joachim Trier's weaker effort.

Don't get me wrong, Trier as a director does a lot more than some directors do in a career. Louder Than Bombs with its English language dialogue and characters seem to have something 'missing' that really makes it compelling to watch. There are times and sequences in which that resembles Trier's earlier (and much later) work; the story that Conrad (Devin Druid) writes and tells is full of imaginative moments that personify memories as Conrad describes it. Jesse Eisenberg's character Jonah is treading the same sort of ground that Anders Danielsen Lie would do in The Worst Person in the World. Gene (Gabriel Byrne) following his son Conrad throughout town reminded me of Lie's character walking around in Oslo, August 31st. Conrad and Melanie (Ruby Jerins)'s walk home after a party seems like the same sort of romanticism that appeared with Renate Reinsve and Herbert Nordrum when "time would stop" in The Worst Person in the World. (To be honest, Jerins would be perfect playing a daughter of Reinsve's character if Trier ever wants to do that). Jonah woken up with loud music from Conrad's room and finding Conrad dancing to it recalls loud music sequences found in Reprise and in The Worst Person in the World. The point is that what Trier does as a director is within Louder Than Bombs, just not as good as usual.

This isn't to say there are interesting or great scenes in the movie. The metatextual scenes where Conrad and Jonah look at Gene's headshot ("What are you looking at? You look like you're about to kill someone!") and they watching Gabriel Byrne in Hello Again while acting like that's their dad are great moments. Also, there's a long, lingering shot of Huppert's face in one scene that's a bit Bergmanesque as well.

For all the stylistic flourishes and moody soundtrack, Louder Than Bombs has an overall flat story and characters. The story is about the family of Isabelle Reed (Isabelle Huppert) processing and thinking through their grief of her passing after a car accident. The problem is the movie doesn't really go into it as far as dealing with the characters' grief; it's very surface level. Gene has a relationship with Conrad's teacher; Jonah has an affair with Erin (Rachel Brosnahan) after his wife Amy (Megan Ketch) gives birth. It turns out that Isabelle was having an affair with Richard (David Strathairn) behind Gene's back. The movie substitutes character growth for moroseness; having affairs and the consequences not even being shown doesn't make for a compelling drama. In the end, Gene drives Jonah back to his wife with Conrad in tow, so I guess they'll just be miserable together (although there's a really nice black and white sequence where Conrad talks about an old guy brought to a gallery exhibit of Isabelle and apparently the old guy symbolizes Jonah's baby).

Despite all that, the movie is well filmed and does have beautiful sequences, even if it's a bit unimaginative at times. Upstate New York wouldn't be confused for Trier's Oslo in his earlier movies. Joachim Trier has done better and will do better.

Billie Eilish - Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D) (saw in the theaters) - 4/5 stars

Spoiler

I am admittedly not the target audience for this concert film. (I only vaguely knew about Billie Eilish from this: youtu.be/VSPuRXkUWoU?si=sQ-_R0GESKUXILAO and her doing "What Was I Made For?" from Barbie that actually made me feel miserable after I heard it).

What I noticed and liked is how Eilish isn't trying to dress like a pretty pop singer and just shows up for her concert like she just woke up and she was a Juggalo from 1996. Yet the people watching it and the camera focuses on are crying and sobbing to her lyrics. Some of them are interviewed later and they have a genuine emotional connection to her songs.

I found myself liking the interview segments where James Cameron asks her about her music, her inspirations, and what she's trying to say in her music. She actually mentions that she doesn't feel a pressure to look a certain way and wants to performs songs that connect for her. From watching the movie, I didn't understand it, but I did feel that she was trying to present herself as a genuinely good person.

The drawback is all the songs sound the same, but are visually stunning to watch with the camera placement - the handheld camera she would use and the camera inside the cage she stands or sits in. Visual wise reminded me a bit of The Moment.

Also, if you're going to talk about hard and soft, why did she not do a Pet Shop Boys' "West End Girls" cover?

If I were a teenager born in 2001 and growing up in the time that Billie Eilish became popular, it's possible I would have connected to the music and to her. I would have been one of those teenagers crying at the show when James Cameron asked me what I thought of the show.

Thelma (2017) (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 4/5 stars

Spoiler

A movie like Thelma probably wouldn't work in America. In America, especially in the Southern United States, religion controlling people's actions have a foothold and an acceptance almost too easily. With this, Thelma (Eili Harboe) is a college student in Oslo who is part of a religious sect of Christianity. Christianity in a place like Norway isn't really considered a power in the country; like one of the college students Thelma flippantly says, "It's like believing in Santa Claus."

What Joachim Trier does is tie religious belief with control over Thelma's abilities. At the start of the movie, her father Trond (Henrik Rafaelsen) contemplates shooting her in a forest. Thelma's abilities manifest while in college when birds hit windows and she goes into convulsions. Where it seems to centralize is meeting Anja (Kaya Wilkins). Anja brings about things in Thelma's life that expands her life and also make her parents try to tighten their control over her. At a dance exhibition, Anja holds Thelma's hand while she begins to convulse as Thelma thinks about Anja. Thelma excuses herself and grabs her coat, with Anja finding her and they kiss.

Thelma realizes that she loves Anja after spending the night with her and despite what her father tells her. "Do you think she really loves you?" he says. Later, it's revealed that these abilities have always been there, much like in Brian De Palma's Carrie and The Fury and in 1984's Firestarter. The abilities are a bit more subtle and aren't overwhelming forces like in those movies. Thelma during a medical treatment causes Anja to disappear through the window of her apartment.

Thelma learns the truth about her grandmother, whom her parents told her was dead. Her grandmother have the same abilities; she caused her grandfather to disappear and blamed herself into a catatonic state. Thelma goes back to her parents and it is learned what happened to her baby brother; he drowns under frozen lake as Thelma teleported him there. Thelma while asleep does something to her father reminscient of the deaths in Leave Her To Heaven; her father goes to the lake to smoke and catches on fire. He eventually drowns as he's exposed to the air.

Thelma eventually learns to control her powers; earlier when she made Anja disappear at the hospital, the places that Thelma remembers her had her absent. Anja's reappearance causes Thelma's phone to ring. Thelma heals her mother and her mother is able to walk. Thelma returns back to Oslo and she and Anja are now dating.

What Joachim Trier did in this is somewhat similar to how Robert Bresson would shoot his films with a detached tone and camerawork. It makes the horror aspects of the movie a bit more subtle and it feels more like a medical/psychological drama than necessarily a horror movie. There are points where it is horrific, like Anja's disappearance and Thelma imagining herself trapped in a swimming pool.

This is probably one of Trier's better efforts.

Gentleman Jim (HBO Max, leaving on 5/31) - 3.5/5 stars

Spoiler

The boxing scenes are genuinely compelling to watch with how the cameras are placed, shot compositions and selection, and mis en scene with the crowds of people watching the fights. The rest of the movie is a weak romance with Jim Corbett (Errol Flynn) trying to win Victoria Ware (Alexis Smith)'s heart and building up to fight John L. Sullivan (Ward Bond).

There's some ahead of its time montages and using a picture frame to zoom into crowds walking around or Corbett standing for a photo. For the most part, the movie is great despite Corbett not encountering any challenges and turning his opponents' brains into hamburger meat.

Flynn played Corbett as a bit of a cheerful ass, while Bond played Sullivan as bragging ass. The scene with Sullivan giving Corbett the title was a great bit of acting.

I could do without Corbett's numerous extended family members though.

Gentleman Jim isn't bad and is a decent biopic.

Watched Ira Sachs' short film Lady on Mubi. 

Edited May 11 by Andrew POE!

[HarryArchieGus]

12 hours ago, Andrew POE! said:

Yeah, I'm hoping I didn't overrate Blue Heron, but it really stuck with me. I'm glad you like Mile End Kicks (one of the few times in a chain theater where the movie began right away at start time). 

I saw They All Laughed sometime last month (or maybe the month prior) on HBO Max. Despite the tragedy around the lead actress' death, it's generally a great movie. 

I'll probably watch The Man Who Loved Women (both versions) sooner than later. Same with 1983's Breathless that showed up on Criterion Channel. 

I started on the wrong movies with Visconti - I'm wanting to go in release order like I did with Antonioni. I did watch Zabriskie Point on HBO Max not long ago and gave it five stars. I'm thinking of doing something where I watch Visconti's Obsession before I watch the new movie out this weekend called Obsession. They obviously won't fit thematically but it's a nice experiment. 

Blue Heron's praise seems pretty unanimous from the word of mouth I'm receiving. Maybe throw DePalma's Obsession inbetween to connect the dots. 

I'm curious of those American remakes. Blake Edwards tackling the Man Who Loved Women is interesting. I don't have high expectations for Gere in the American Breathless. 

9 hours ago, Andrew POE! said:

Selected movies today...

Louder Than Bombs (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 3/5 stars

  Hide contents

Louder Than Bombs is probably Joachim Trier's weaker effort.

Don't get me wrong, Trier as a director does a lot more than some directors do in a career. Louder Than Bombs with its English language dialogue and characters seem to have something 'missing' that really makes it compelling to watch. There are times and sequences in which that resembles Trier's earlier (and much later) work; the story that Conrad (Devin Druid) writes and tells is full of imaginative moments that personify memories as Conrad describes it. Jesse Eisenberg's character Jonah is treading the same sort of ground that Anders Danielsen Lie would do in The Worst Person in the World. Gene (Gabriel Byrne) following his son Conrad throughout town reminded me of Lie's character walking around in Oslo, August 31st. Conrad and Melanie (Ruby Jerins)'s walk home after a party seems like the same sort of romanticism that appeared with Renate Reinsve and Herbert Nordrum when "time would stop" in The Worst Person in the World. (To be honest, Jerins would be perfect playing a daughter of Reinsve's character if Trier ever wants to do that). Jonah woken up with loud music from Conrad's room and finding Conrad dancing to it recalls loud music sequences found in Reprise and in The Worst Person in the World. The point is that what Trier does as a director is within Louder Than Bombs, just not as good as usual.

This isn't to say there are interesting or great scenes in the movie. The metatextual scenes where Conrad and Jonah look at Gene's headshot ("What are you looking at? You look like you're about to kill someone!") and they watching Gabriel Byrne in Hello Again while acting like that's their dad are great moments. Also, there's a long, lingering shot of Huppert's face in one scene that's a bit Bergmanesque as well.

For all the stylistic flourishes and moody soundtrack, Louder Than Bombs has an overall flat story and characters. The story is about the family of Isabelle Reed (Isabelle Huppert) processing and thinking through their grief of her passing after a car accident. The problem is the movie doesn't really go into it as far as dealing with the characters' grief; it's very surface level. Gene has a relationship with Conrad's teacher; Jonah has an affair with Erin (Rachel Brosnahan) after his wife Amy (Megan Ketch) gives birth. It turns out that Isabelle was having an affair with Richard (David Strathairn) behind Gene's back. The movie substitutes character growth for moroseness; having affairs and the consequences not even being shown doesn't make for a compelling drama. In the end, Gene drives Jonah back to his wife with Conrad in tow, so I guess they'll just be miserable together (although there's a really nice black and white sequence where Conrad talks about an old guy brought to a gallery exhibit of Isabelle and apparently the old guy symbolizes Jonah's baby).

Despite all that, the movie is well filmed and does have beautiful sequences, even if it's a bit unimaginative at times. Upstate New York wouldn't be confused for Trier's Oslo in his earlier movies. Joachim Trier has done better and will do better.

Billie Eilish - Hit Me Hard and Soft: The Tour (Live in 3D) (saw in the theaters) - 4/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

I am admittedly not the target audience for this concert film. (I only vaguely knew about Billie Eilish from this: youtu.be/VSPuRXkUWoU?si=sQ-_R0GESKUXILAO and her doing "What Was I Made For?" from Barbie that actually made me feel miserable after I heard it).

What I noticed and liked is how Eilish isn't trying to dress like a pretty pop singer and just shows up for her concert like she just woke up and she was a Juggalo from 1996. Yet the people watching it and the camera focuses on are crying and sobbing to her lyrics. Some of them are interviewed later and they have a genuine emotional connection to her songs.

I found myself liking the interview segments where James Cameron asks her about her music, her inspirations, and what she's trying to say in her music. She actually mentions that she doesn't feel a pressure to look a certain way and wants to performs songs that connect for her. From watching the movie, I didn't understand it, but I did feel that she was trying to present herself as a genuinely good person.

The drawback is all the songs sound the same, but are visually stunning to watch with the camera placement - the handheld camera she would use and the camera inside the cage she stands or sits in. Visual wise reminded me a bit of The Moment.

Also, if you're going to talk about hard and soft, why did she not do a Pet Shop Boys' "West End Girls" cover?

If I were a teenager born in 2001 and growing up in the time that Billie Eilish became popular, it's possible I would have connected to the music and to her. I would have been one of those teenagers crying at the show when James Cameron asked me what I thought of the show.

Thelma (2017) (Criterion Channel, leaving on 5/31) - 4/5 stars

  Reveal hidden contents

A movie like Thelma probably wouldn't work in America. In America, especially in the Southern United States, religion controlling people's actions have a foothold and an acceptance almost too easily. With this, Thelma (Eili Harboe) is a college student in Oslo who is part of a religious sect of Christianity. Christianity in a place like Norway isn't really considered a power in the country; like one of the college students Thelma flippantly says, "It's like believing in Santa Claus."

What Joachim Trier does is tie religious belief with control over Thelma's abilities. At the start of the movie, her father Trond (Henrik Rafaelsen) contemplates shooting her in a forest. Thelma's abilities manifest while in college when birds hit windows and she goes into convulsions. Where it seems to centralize is meeting Anja (Kaya Wilkins). Anja brings about things in Thelma's life that expands her life and also make her parents try to tighten their control over her. At a dance exhibition, Anja holds Thelma's hand while she begins to convulse as Thelma thinks about Anja. Thelma excuses herself and grabs her coat, with Anja finding her and they kiss.

Thelma realizes that she loves Anja after spending the night with her and despite what her father tells her. "Do you think she really loves you?" he says. Later, it's revealed that these abilities have always been there, much like in Brian De Palma's Carrie and The Fury and in 1984's Firestarter. The abilities are a bit more subtle and aren't overwhelming forces like in those movies. Thelma during a medical treatment causes Anja to disappear through the window of her apartment.

Thelma learns the truth about her grandmother, whom her parents told her was dead. Her grandmother have the same abilities; she caused her grandfather to disappear and blamed herself into a catatonic state. Thelma goes back to her parents and it is learned what happened to her baby brother; he drowns under frozen lake as Thelma teleported him there. Thelma while asleep does something to her father reminscient of the deaths in Leave Her To Heaven; her father goes to the lake to smoke and catches on fire. He eventually drowns as he's exposed to the air.

Thelma eventually learns to control her powers; earlier when she made Anja disappear at the hospital, the places that Thelma remembers her had her absent. Anja's reappearance causes Thelma's phone to ring. Thelma heals her mother and her mother is able to walk. Thelma returns back to Oslo and she and Anja are now dating.

What Joachim Trier did in this is somewhat similar to how Robert Bresson would shoot his films with a detached tone and camerawork. It makes the horror aspects of the movie a bit more subtle and it feels more like a medical/psychological drama than necessarily a horror movie. There are points where it is horrific, like Anja's disappearance and Thelma imagining herself trapped in a swimming pool.

This is probably one of Trier's better efforts.

Interested to see Thelma, and happy for the reminder. I think I liked Louder than Bombs a little more, but that's a fair review. I really liked seeing Trier take on the challenge of working in English. Far better results than some, but not on par with his Oslo Trilogy or Sentimental Value. Speaking of the Oslo Trilogy, I'm also hoping to see Dag Johan Haugerud's version soon with the films Love, Sex, and Dreams - all on the Criterion Channel. John Waters named each in his favourites of 2025, and I generally trust critic Waters. 

[Andrew POE!]

20 minutes ago, HarryArchieGus said:

Blue Heron's praise seems pretty unanimous from the word of mouth I'm receiving. Maybe throw DePalma's Obsession inbetween to connect the dots. 

I'm curious of those American remakes. Blake Edwards tackling the Man Who Loved Women is interesting. I don't have high expectations for Gere in the American Breathless. 

Interested to see Thelma, and happy for the reminder. I think I liked Louder than Bombs a little more, but that's a fair review. I really liked seeing Trier take on the challenge of working in English. Far better results than some, but not on par with his Oslo Trilogy or Sentimental Value. Speaking of the Oslo Trilogy, I'm also hoping to see Dag Johan Haugerud's version soon with the films Love, Sex, and Dreams - all on the Criterion Channel. John Waters named each in his favourites of 2025, and I generally trust critic Waters. 

I've already seen De Palma's Obsession, but wasn't too enthused about it. I'll look into a rewatch though. 

Yeah, I actually liked Gere in almost everything I've seen of him (except for Runaway Bride). So maybe I'll like the American Breathless. 

Trier working in English is interesting - Sentimental Value showed that he can do it better than his first attempt. Maybe his next movie will have him be fully in English and possibly better. I'll probably need to watch Dag Johan Haugerud's trilogy soonish. 

[odessasteps]

 

[Technico Support]

KAREN!!!  WHY’D YOU DO THAT, KAREN?!

I’m spacing on which poster here has coked up Henry Hill as his avatar but it’s definitely in my DVDVR board avatars Mount Rushmore.

Edited May 12 by Technico Support

[J.H.]

How would one observe Henry Hill gets busted day?

6:55am Get-up, do line of coke, put gun in paper bag

7-9am Pick-up relative at hospital. D Dr op off silencers at friends house

9-11am start sauce. "Red Lead" which includes meatballs, sausage with tomato gravy.

12pm-3pm Have relative watch sauce. Prepare to make drug deal

Dear lord Henry Hill was a spectacular Sleazeball!

James

 

Edited May 12 by J.H.