I’ve been impressed with Halide’s “Process Zero” camera mode, which shoots RAW photos, but tones down Apple’s default aggressive noise reduction. It also lets shadows be shadows and highlights be highlights. I fine-tuned these photos a bit in Lightroom, so they were less contrasty, but they already …
I hadn’t seen “Amelie” since its release 20+ years ago. It’s cute! On this viewing, I appreciated the sound design, the dialogue of the older man who has “glass bones,” and how Amelie is a complicated anti-hero serving vigilante justice. I wonder if Parisians hate this movie. It’s very French, of …
It’s good! I love the action and how the story expands the lore of this very strange, violent world. The driving scenes here are just as astounding as those in Fury Road. The story takes place over years vs days, so the movie, by necessity, has to stop and start with the action. It’s just different. …
I’d never seen a movie in a theater while on vacation abroad… until I watched Challengers at an Amsterdam art house theater on a weekday afternoon. Highly recommended. Anyway! In my entirely professional opinion… Challengers needs to be gayer. Seriously! Between this and Call Me By Your Name, …
My bestie Alan Ishii introduced me to Mae West, with a new year’s eve screening of I’m No Angel. We texted about it afterward. Turns out, Alan knows quite a bit about Mae West! With his permission, I’ve reconstructed his texts, below 😊 Something important to keep in mind, with Mae and Marlene, they …
While making an homage to action films, Edgar Wright establishes himself as one of the great action directors working today. Things I appreciate on this rewatch: How Simon Pegg and Nick Frost trade roles throughout the Cornetto Trilogy “Stay back, or the ginger nut gets it!” Truly one of the best …
I now have an Ergodox EZ for my WFH office. It’s a split mechanical keyboard with adjustable legs on each corner. I appreciate the adjustability of the legs — they create an ergonomic, negatively tilted typing angle — and the solid build quality of the case and keys. These features are not a given …
In which hit-persons do a terrible job of killing each other, and unintentionally do a marvelous job of terrorizing European cities. The characters are all cold professionals. The film, likewise, leaves me a bit cold. The top-notch cast and car chase scenes make this movie memorable.
This is the first Mae West movie I’ve seen. It’s strange! West certainly has on-screen charisma and delivers clever comebacks. Buuut since she wrote the script, that also means most of the runtime is devoted to showing off how cool and rich her character — and by extension, she — is. Although I give …
The script isn’t quiiite as clever as I remember everyone saying it is. And it suffers from employing the lazy and false movie trope that torture results in good intel. But! The movie looks great, the actors (especially Russell Crowe) are impressive, and the plot moves along at a steady clip. Side …
In which Stewie decides to hop on my chest as I ride on a foam roller. Special thanks to Benjamin Siegel for his editing suggestions 🙏
It’s always worth watching Miyazaki’s gorgeous watercolor paintings on the big screen. With that said… this is my least favorite Miyazaki film 🙊 It’s trying to be too many movies at once. And similar to Princess Mononoke’s last act, this world’s rules feel made up and scrambled together. And thanks …
I would have hated this movie as a cynical 18-year-old, but I appreciate the story’s maturity and optimism. It’s lovely and sweet. Ryan Gosling’s dramatic performances usually leave me cold, but there’s so much depth to his acting here — I’m blown away.
My least favorite Tarantino film. It’s nearly three hours of torture porn, masquerading as revenge fantasy to avenge slavery. The incessant violence, screams of people suffering, and depictions of slavers assaulting slaves… they are presented as something we should find entertaining. I suspect …
My favorite movie from the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I’m so glad that on rewatch 22 years later, it still holds up. It’s truly epic, and I love how the actors and filmmakers treat the source material seriously. On this viewing, three things stood out: That decaying remnants of …
I’m grateful that my friend Brian Hibbert recommended Basquiat. It’s a cool film with an amazing cast! I’ll quote Brian from our message thread: It’s one of the best films about… like the friction between art and commerce. One of the cool things about that film is that it was …
Watching this 13 years after its release, where we’re saturated with movies with multi-verses, Inception takes a long time and many pages of dialogue to get the plot started. Everyone is so damn chatty! Thankfully, the scale and spectacle still dazzle. Especially when the cross-cutting and …
And joined my semi-retired parents on their own 60-day trip through Western Europe. I’d love for you to check out the photos I took in Barcelona, Granada, and Madrid. The country is beautiful, and I found the people to be so warm and helpful. But the start of the trip went wrong in so many ways, all …
I watched Logan back in 2017, in a second run theater full of parents and their young kids. It was disturbing, hearing the adults cheer loudly whenever a character got brutally maimed. And like John Connor watching boys fight in Terminator 2, it made me question how any of us turn out OK. Rewatching …
I’m in the minority with this opinion: Nolan has a tendency to tell, rather than show, even though he often shoots with large film formats like IMAX. Take the strange lack of scale in Dunkirk, where Nolan managed to make thousands of British soldiers evacuating feel like a small-scale affair. …
I tried watching “Wild Tigers” back in 2007, when I was starting college, but just couldn’t get into it. I’m glad Altered Innocence re-released it in multiple formats, with a beautiful new transfer. The movie sits at this important, transitionary phase in indie films, and with gay and trans …
The 2000s-era Mexico captured here feels so alive. I love how every moment has something going on in the background and foreground. The three horny main characters are messy and complicated and beautiful — just like their country. I love Children of Men, too, but I find myself returning to this …
Cool, nerdy film fact about “Oppenheimer” 🤓 From AP News: “Nolan’s desire for the black and white portions to be of equal image quality to the rest of the film led to the development of the first ever black and white IMAX film stock, which Kodak made and Fotokem developed." In recent decades, …
“They were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, that they didn’t stop to think if they should.”
The entertainment industry is only possible because of the necessary tension between art and commerce. No movie I’ve seen explores that intersection better than “Barbie.” I loved it. Tangentially, this would make for a great double feature with “Josie and the Pussy …