Dune Part 2

Part 2 really plays like David Lean made a science fiction movie. In every way it’s epic. All of the designs and cinematography are sublime. The performances are all very serious - taking wild plot points and delivering them with gravity, up to and including Rebecca Ferguson chatting with her unborn child telepathically. There’s no real point in mentioning the effects anymore – they’re always exceptional. But these movies never end. I knew how this would be. It’s called Part 2. It’s right in the title. So walking out of the theater in a rush of oxytocin has become less frequent these days. But it has to be commended for no other reason than everybody had to have worked REALLY hard.

Letters to Juliet

At the end of this sappy, pointless 2010 romance, Amanda Seyfried perfectly delivers the one and only funny/hilarious line in this entire dull, travelogue of clichés. And she knocks it out of the park. Is it worth sitting through this entire movie for this one perfectly delivered gag? No, it is not. The scenery does most of the heavy lifting here, and it’s nothing you haven’t seen before.

Dune

Rewatched in preparation for Part 2. It’s talky sci-fi, and the details of the plot often reveal in bits of dialogue. But, man, they made this movie. It’s glorious to behold and not a sour note in the whole experience. It’s never slow. The really memorable scenes are the small-scale struggles, the escapes, and the mano a mano battles - superhero action stars seemingly thrilled to be doing something different. Eager for Part 2.

Poor Things

The point of this seems to be: a woman’s decisions are her own, no matter how terrible they are. As a woman with a baby’s brain, Emma Stone turns-in an incredible, vulnerable physical performance. But it’s hard not to think that all the grotesque men in her life are really using and abusing her in a way that even a fantasy steam-punk netherworld can’t disguise. It’s a magical place with no pregnancies or STDs, and look at all those pretty dresses! Everything is filmed in a Jean-Pierre Junet fish-eye, wide-angle, and the music is weird, forcing all of the proceedings to feel like one big, long dream. It never grounds itself, even for a second. It’s visionary, and I’m happy this was made, but all the over-modulation leaves me piqued but not entirely satisfied.

The Holdovers

Everyone knows: the teaming up of Paul Giamatti and Alexander Payne can only be a recipe for great things. This is so sad and so poignant; it’s a melancholy masterwork. The three key performances are sharp and deep. It’s rare for a movie to be this astute and emotional as it says what so many people think about Christmas: Christmas sucks. It’s okay if Paul Giamatti doesn’t win the Oscar for this. He’s in a class by himself. Dear Hollywood, be kind to Giamatti. Pay him well. Give him a nice trailer. He’s a national treasure.

El Conde

Presented in beautiful black and white, this Chilean Vampire comedy is an odd-duck. Sometimes Farrelly/Zucker Brothers absurd, and sometimes grey and gloomy in a Woody Allen way. I’m happy this was made, and the filmmaker’s SEEM to have had carte blanche to produce this romantic-comedy horror outlier. It’s probably an allegory for something political in Chili that I don’t quite get, as it skates the line between vampire and satire. But it’s original, you gotta give it that.

The Marvels

This has a Guardians of the Galaxy nuttiness to it. Superhero schtick. Performances are all good; trying to crossover between physical comedy and action heroics. But it feels diversionary. The stakes are low. I mean the world can’t be in jeopardy of ending in EVERY movie, can it? Also, there’s A LOT of cat stuff in this. It’s really cat-heavy. So if you like cats, this one’s for you.