First five films of the year already watched - Ikiru - 9.5/10 Influencer - 6/10 Influencers - 6.5/10 Coffy - 8.5/10 Summer Wars - 8/10
Going through the entirety of the main feature films of Happy Madison Productions (plus the two from Madison 23 Productions and the single one from Scary Madison Productions), which come to 52 films in total, and I am anticipating a great deal of rubbish to befall my eyes - The Take - 6.5/10 Puppet Master 4 - 6/10 Portrait in Crystal - 7.5/10 Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo - 2/10 Double Indemnity - 9/10
The Cult of AGFA Trailer Show - 7/10 Red Spirit Lake - 8/10 Ultra-sleazy DIY/SOV version of Twin Peaks filled with naked witches, feminist themes, fetish film execution, nudity, fake semen, alien abductions interpreted as angelic encounters, splattery revenge, all packed into a tight hour and 10 minutes. Truly unhinged and captivating stuff. American Movie - 10/10 Kid Candidate - 6.5/10
Another mixed bag, although I have now finally finished off the Shawscope Volume Four box set from Arrow Video with Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. The Primevals - 6/10 Monster Island - 6.5/10 Sharksploitation - 7.5/10 Twinkle Twinkle Little Star - 6/10 District B13 - 8/10
It was decent enough, if you have seen a few Full Moon Pictures from the early nineties, then you will know exactly what you are getting into. I am just glad it exists and was finally finished.
The Fantastic Four: First Steps - 6.5/10 As a relative Marvel grump, I really loved a lot of this, which in turn made some of its faults even more glaring and frustrating. The aesthetics are obviously super pleasing and most of the performances are solid (Vanessa Kirby runs circles around everyone here), but some of the visual effects and editing are just...so distractingly bizarre, and not in an endearing way, unfortunately. (For example, there's hardly any Mr. Fantastic stretching, which winds up being a blessing considering how the stretching that is here looks.) Ultimately, despite a climax that feels slightly rushed and underwhelming, I really enjoyed the time spent with these characters and thought the emotional stakes felt real (I still have New Dad Sucker Syndrome), so I'm inclined to feel forgiving simply based on the amount of sincerity and how little ironic, "that just happened" Marvel humor was here.
The CG baby made me so palpably angry after putting so much visual care into the aesthetics of the set design and costuming.
The Poughkeepsie Tapes - 5.5/10 American Dragons - 6/10 Black Gunn - 6.5/10 Phantom from Space - 5/10 Sentimental Value - 8/10
A Complete Unknown - Despite not being a big Dylan fan, I was looking forward to this one. Unfortunately, it really doesn’t escape the worst parts of music biopics. No it doesn’t start with Bob Dylan thinking about his whole life, but it’s still filled with songwriting that seems to come out of thin air, reaction shots from people hearing those songs for the first time that are so over the top, and it all culminates around the big performance. It gets a little better in the second half but it’s overall just kind of dull.