Movies/Shows you're watching.

[Enjoyed]

Y'all seen Weapons???

I fucking loved it. Don't want to say too much, but would love to know if anyone else has seen it, and if they enjoyed it!
I had such an amazing time watching it, and will very much be looking forward to Mr Cregger's next venture.

[Bosco]

@Enjoyed 

I'll try and watch it soon, I see it's available on HBO app!

Doing my best to get back into a TV/movie watching groove for the colder months. Hoping to finally catch up and watch 'M: Son of the Century'.

[Enjoyed]

@Enjoyed

I'll try and watch it soon, I see it's available on HBO app!

Doing my best to get back into a TV/movie watching groove for the colder months. Hoping to finally catch up and watch 'M: Son of the Century'.

Yesssss!

I have a big list of spookies to watch throughout the month. Not always easy to find the time (or mood, honestly) to sit down and watch - but Weapons was a big one I was ready for! Also gonna watch Bring Her Back on Halloween night 👻

And on the TV front, I've been very unashamedly enjoying the second season of Wednesday. Something about family friendly "horror" or fantasy just hits the perfect spot for me!

[satur8]

Pluribis has my immediate attention and I cannot wait for more!

I am a huge fan of Severance, Andor, Dark, and Murderbot (to name a few varieties in the genre), and so far this fits right in with some philosophical questions about autonomy, perspective, and consent. with parallels to real world issues we are about to face with the rapid advancement of AI.

[Wolkenkrabber]

Y'all seen Weapons???

I imagined this film was going to be somewhere between Prisoners (Villeneuve) and the Michael Shannon film, Midnight Special (Underrated! - check it out). But it turned out to be a

Spoiler

wicked witch

movie!! Also I felt slightly mislead by the intro voiceover kid. We're told that

Spoiler

"the kids left and never come back". But they DID come back!

It's good film-making overall though, so fingers crossed that Creggar's next project goes well.

While I'm on slightly deceptive films...
Sinners. I imagined this was going to be somewhere between Goodfellas and Miller's Crossing (but less Italian/Irish obvs), but it's

Spoiler

a frickin vampire movie!

Again, good film -making and performances so I'll cross my fingers for Ryan Coogler's next film (well that's Black Panther 3, but after that...)

Pluribis has my immediate attention and I cannot wait for more!
...with parallels to real world issues we are about to face with the rapid advancement of AI.

But also Invasion Of The Body Snatchers!
I didn't watch Breaking Bad or Better Call Saul until both were completely finished. I hope I don't regret jumping into the latest Vince Gilligan project too soon. It has been pretty engaging, but I just watched the latest episode - 8 - and it felt like a filler episode to me. Fingers crossed that it finishes strong. The 9th episode is the series finale, right?

Mickey 17 , in Bong Joon Ho ( Okja / Parasite ) we trust ,  i completely enjoyed the South Korean filmmaker's latest movie

He addresses issues of opression and power quite a lot doesn't he? But yeah this felt quite original nonetheless. Like Okja, it was kinda quirky and unique in it's look and feel.

Superman was joyous.

Much better than I expected from the early clips/trailers. I do however agree with Pitch Meeting guy's point about Lex Luthor: "a guy yelling orders at another guy who then enters the orders into a computer and then a clone does those moves". Good overall though.

Thunderbolts- a surprisingly fun little "Avengers" style superhero movie. Perhaps the lack of hype actually helped.

Fantastic Four- a very watcahable retro-future reboot. But isn't this basically the Rise Of Silver Surfer (2007) movie again?

One Battle After Another. Paul Thomas Anderson returns! Wasn't convinced by Sean Penn's first and last scenes TBH - the writing rather than the performance. Other than that, pretty good.

Code 3 - an ambulance action dramedy! ER meets Scrubs but with more ambulance. I liked it!

Wake Up Dead Man - Didn't think I'd like it as much as the other Knives Out films. But I did!

Venom: The Last Dance - not as good as the first one
Den of Thieves 2 - better than the first one!
The Accountant 2 - not as good as 1
The Old Guard 2 - Charleze gets a bigger budget but a bad ending. WTF!? The guy who plays Mussolini in Son Of The Century is in it. He was in the first one too. But he's very different in these films.
Another Simple Favor - not as good as the first one.
Nobody 2 - not as good as the first one
Tron Ares - not as good as the first one
Jurassic World: Rebirth- Not as good as the first one (!) but ScarJo is always watchable.
Happy Gilmore 2 -I actually enjoyed this! Good golfer cameos too! Scotty Scheffler is a natural (actor)!

Warefare: 92% on Rotten Tomatoes. Not easy viewing but gripping.
Nosferatu- pretty good if a little long. It turns out that Nepo Baby, Lily Rose Depp didn't just inherit her parents cheekbones; she can actually act!

Death Of a Unicorn. Started off good but perhaps overstayed its welcome.
Havoc : Also started off good, but by the end it somehow fell slightly short.
Music from both of these films at the end of the post.

The Gorge: Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy playing drums and playing chess cos they had done it in their previous works was silly. The whole film was silly.

Flight Risk -reasonably fun Mark Wahlberg action-thriller-comedy directed by Mel Gibson.
Play Dirty - Mark Wahlberg again. I thought it was better than its 5.9 IMDB score.

Following on from Yorgos Lanthimos' Poor Things (pretty good) we get the two films below. I guess the director has found his muse in Emma Stone. She seems to have become his favourite since starring with Olivia Colman in... The Favorite.
Kinds Of Kindness. This felt a little under-explained. Almost good, but odd.
Bugonia. If you were prepared to go with the ending, then this was actually pretty good. Emma Stone keeps her clothes on in this one, unlike her previous two Lanthimos films.

Eddington. Emma Stone again. I stopped after an hour. Did I miss mutch?
The Electric State - Better than I expected.
Black Bag. Famous director, good cast. A parnoid spy thriller. A couple of James Bond connections. Decent.
The Assessment - intriguing low budget sci-fi with a creepy Alicia Vikander. Worth it.
Freaky Tales - may have a similar story telling style to Pulp Fiction but not quite as good!
Ballerina - I actually wanted to watch at the cinema but it disappeared so quickly I had to stream it at home. I guess this John Wick spin-off series(?) isn't going to have the same success.
F1- Brad Pitt is a bit too old to be racing F1 cars but I enjoyed this anyway.
Honey Don't - Like Burn After Reading, this Ethan Cohen film was enjoyable to watch but the ending snuck up on me. It left a lot of loose ends unaddressed.
The Luckiest Man in America- Paul Walter Hauser is everywhere now, isn't he? Kept me watching.
Americana - Paul Walter Hauser was good in this too. I thnk the IMDB score is harsh. This theoretically came out in 2023 but didn't get a commercial release until 2025. Sydney Good Jeans was bearable too!
Caught Stealing - directed by Darren Aronofsky. It was engaging but I couldn't really accept the ending as a "win".
A House of Dynamite - really engaging from Kathryn "hurt locker" Bigelow, but the final segment was sooo frustrating.
The Smashing Machine- The Rock makes an A24 movie! I wanted to like this but I got tired of the spousal bickering.
Roofman. I wanted MORE McDonalds break-ins!


Death Of A Unicorn had a Cocteau Twins track very early in the film. From The Heaven Or Las Vegas album, which The Chems have said was a tour bus favourite when touring the US. Cherry Coloured Funk. Coinicdentally the current Essential Mix from Romy of The XX has a remix of this track.

Cocteau Twins – Cherry-Coloured Funk (Stijn's House Mix)

Original version (as featured in the film) under spoiler, but it's not a spoiler.

Spoiler

Meanwhile Havoc has not one, not two, not three, not four but FIVE tracks by Gesaffelstein on it's soundtrack. Most of them appearing in a club scene with a big gunfight. One of those five tracks was also on the Old Guard 2 soundtrack. The one below:

Gesaffelstein - HATE OR GLORY

[shakermaker]

Again, good film -making and performances so I'll cross my fingers for Ryan Coogler's next film

that music scene was incredible. one of the best scenes in my recent memory of cinema.

which is quite unexpected embedded within a fucking **spoiler** movie! 

[Bosco]

this could have some cross-over appeal for "discussions on difficult subjects".

Mark Ruffalo with an off-the-cuff answer at the Golden Globes:

This isn't the only time Mark has voiced concern, he's quite the activist and a downright, great actor.


Check out his work in movies like:

• 'Shutter Island'
• 'Spotlight'
• 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind'
• (and maybe one of the most recommendable movies that I can give...) 'Zodiac'

Also the muse for 'Ordinary Sausage' on YouTube:

[Csar]

Yeah, I was really impressed, so to speak, when I saw him at one of those rallys last year, No Kings I guess it was, where he was interviewed*.

He genuinely seems to care. Kudos to him also having the guts to raise this at the Globes as well.

*Edit

As for your recommendations: Love Shutter Island and especially Zodiac! I think it was indeed around 2007 or 2008 when I became really "fascinated" by this case as it was based on real events. However, before I was aware of Fincher's take on Zodiac, I had come across that topic via another movie from 2005 that was broadcast on national TV - the Zodiac. It's significantly shorter and less complex than Fincher's version but nonetheless quite riveting. The last scene really left an impression on me back then where they cited one of Zodiacs letters: "I am waiting for a good movie about me. Who will play me?  I am now in control of all things.".
I got so interested in the subject matter that, sometime later, I even bought a book about the case, self-publishedby a guy who collected all sorts evidence and police reports, Zodiac letters and so on. I scoured the internet for any info I could get. Fun times.
Then I came across Finchers movie and loved it. When it got released as a Bluray I had to get it.

[Wolkenkrabber]

Y'all seen Weapons

I fucking loved it. Don't want to say too much, but would love to know if anyone else has seen it, and if they enjoyed it!
I had such an amazing time watching it

Hope you liked this too.
See, the kids do come back. Roaring back!

[ThePumisher]

Finally watched Brigsby Bear. Damn, why was this on my harddrive for 9 years unwatched? Loved it. If you have a chance, go watch it

[Bosco]

The campiest movie of the century inbound? The fan service is so blinding, that I'm actually entertained by this trailer.

There is absolutely no incentive to watch this film though. You've seen it all in this trailer.

Happy for David Dastmalchian (M. Bison). Dude is an interesting actor and should get a payday.

[Enjoyed]

LOL.

I am so in.

[Stefan]

I went to a small movie festival this week and watched Rosebush Pruning and Obsession.

I thoroughly enjoyed both movies!

[Stefan]

Why did they have to film the Odyssey in real time
Would've been a fun movie otherwise

[Bosco]

I have not seen 'Obsession' or 'Backrooms', I just like the fact they absolutely crushed 'The Mandalorian & Grogu' at the Box office with nearly 16x the budget of 'Backrooms'... 'Obsession' was less than a million!

The director of 'Backroom' was 20 upon release, and the director of 'Obsession' is 26.

My nearest full 70mm IMAX experience for 'Odyssey' is completely sold out for it's scheduled run into next month. It will be interesting if it bumps the next IMAX release which will be in mid August ('The End of Oak St.')

[Wolkenkrabber]

I went to a small movie festival this week and watched Rosebush Pruning and Obsession.

It was very nice of the Honest Trailer folks to do an Honest Trailer for Idiocracy shortly after I watched it (as mentioned in the Sports thread...and now the Difficult Subjects thread), and then just after I watched Obsession, they did one for that too. Good of them to listen to me!
Haven't seen Rosebush Pruning yet, but will keep an eye out.

I feel like Obsession is this year's Get Out (but whiter).
It's from Blumhouse, it's a horror with some humour, and as the Honest Trailer says

Spoiler

"Nikki goes to the sunken place".
Every so often the real Nikki appears in flashes, just like the pre-lobotomised characters in Get Out.
Lots of discussion suggesting that Bear was the bad guy of the piece. I would suggest that he was the (mentally) weak guy rather than actually bad, but hey I guess that's an argument that can be kicked around.

After I watched the Honest Trailer, the YT algo was determined to throw more and more Obsession "making-of" type vids at me. People have really got stuck into this one!
Apparently it  made box office history by becoming the first wide-release movie outside of the Christmas holiday corridor to increase its ticket sales in both its second and third consecutive weekends since Steven Spielberg's E.T. in 1982. Who needs CGI when you have some decent acting and a bit of weird lighting?

On the subject of Speilberg, what did people think of Disclosure Day?

Spoiler

I thought it started off quite compelling but the end almost felt like a damp squib. Reasonable chase scene stuff (except we kept jumping away from it) but maybe the story should have started and ended at a different point. The alien encounter stuff has been done better by...Steven Speilberg (Close Encounters and E.T.).

I have not seen 'Obsession' or 'Backrooms', I just like the fact they absolutely crushed 'The Mandalorian & Grogu' at the Box office with nearly 16x the budget of 'Backrooms'... 'Obsession' was less than a million!

I haven't seen Backrooms either. I've heard people say it's this year's Blair Witch Project, and then others have said "oh no it isn't". I didn't really enjoy Blair Witch so I'm not sure if Backrooms will be for me. But yes it is nice to see low budget, low-CGI movies making an impact.

Some other reasonably low budget, low-CGI films that have "floated my boat" over the past few months are:

Americana. Sydney Sweeney is surprisingly watchable in this. IMDB says: "released 2023" but it only got a wide release recently, I believe.
Rental Family
Dead Man's Wire
Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die
Wardriver. Anyone know what the tune is in the nightclub scene? Is it just part of the original score? Shazam struggled for me. Also, I don't get the low IMDB score.
Carolina Caroline. Badlands meets Bonnie & Clyde. At one point a song from Bruce Springsteen's BadlandsNebraska LP (EDIT Badlands is a song inspired by that film but it's not actually on Nebraska, so my connection is a bit tenuous) actually plays on the car radio, albeit a cover version by Emmylou Harris. Don't be put off by Samara Weaving -I know she's made some trash but she's fine here. 90% on Rotten Toms.
The Get Out. Ok this isn't perfect but Russell Crowe carries it as only he can.
Tuner. If you can forgive the coincidence about the

Spoiler

watch,

then this is good. Nice to see Dustin Hoffman doing his thing, I could have done with more of him actually. Someone in this film (Leo Woodall) is supposedly on the shortlist for the next James Bond.

Project Hail Mary.
Well this one probably does have lots of CGI in it, but it still feels like a character driven story rather than a "sky-beam" type CGI fest. I guess you can tell it's written by the guy who wrote The Martian (book), but it's still pretty good.

Incidentally I noticed that Harry Styles set a Guinness World Records title for the longest residency by a musician at Wembley Stadium in a single run this summer, completing 12 sold-out shows. His run concluded on July 4, 2026, surpassing Coldplay's previous record of 10 nights set in 2025.
Why do I mention this here? Because his song Sign Of The Times pops up in the Hail Mary Project - in karaoke form. Also, on the last night of Styles's Wembley residency, I saw an Insta story from Ed Simons. It was Wembley stadium and we could hear gospel singers on the audio, though the video was of the crowd rather than the stage.
Did Ed go to Harry Styles? Does Styles have more than one good song? 

Well here's the song anyway. I think I'll always associate it with Project Hail Mary now.

EDIT: I'm not recommending Supergirl (2026), but the small-but-enthusiastic Wolf Alice fan group here might like to know that they have a song on the soundtrack.

[Enjoyed]

I'm not recommending Supergirl (2026), but the small-but-enthusiastic Wolf Alice fan group here might like to know that they have a song on the soundtrack.

I was going to post about that little needle drop! I thought it was a great spot for it.
The movie overall was fine. Nowhere near as bad as I was expecting after hearing all of the hate and reports of low box office. Milly was great, the story was fine.

Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die

This was a fun one! It feels like, every so often, there are few more original ideas being brought to life that are worth spending a couple of hours with.

Here's a few of my own recently enjoyed watches:

The Assessment - Alicia Vikander and Elizabeth Olsen acting their asses off. Compelling premise and well executed visually and absolutely with the performances.
Undertone - I haven't seen Obsession yet, and am desperately excited to do so (though may now wait for spooky season to really enjoy it) - but this is easily the best horror movie I've seen for a while. Super simple set up but such a great watch. Definitely get as quiet and as dark as you can manage for it.
Flower - Just kind of picked this at random during a scroll session, to avoid ending up scrolling myself back to YouTube and an early night. I enjoyed it! Absolutely carried by Zoey's performance.
Nirvanna The Band The Show The Movie - Holy fuck was this fun. I had 0 expectations or prior knowledge going in and am so glad for it. Proper old school "wow, I'm having such a good time watching a movie" type experience from this.

Spoiler

Spoiler

The blend of real life hidden camera recording, with scripted scenes and clips was so seamless, the whole thing felt like a mad fever dream. It was just as fun trying to figure out what the fuck was going on, as it was watching the two main characters just existing on screen!

I've seen watch the TV show as well and also thoroughly recommend that, if you end up a fan of the movie. Haven't laughed as much watching TV in... fuck... years? Not even sure the last thing I cracked up watching at this point. Oof.
Backrooms - Throwing this in to address the comments about it being the new Blair Witch. I'm afraid I'm with the "it's not" camp. It was an interesting movie, and visually super interesting and intriguing, but it left me wanting more from the concept than I felt it delivered. Which may have been me wanting too much from an expanded internet meme. Still, worth seeing for the sets and some of the ideas that were explored.
Project Hail Mary - Bloody brilliant, honestly. Loved every second of it. A surprising case of "lives up to the hype".
Ready Or Not & Ready Or Not 2: Here I Come - Also both a lot of fun! Can you see a theme here? I just want to have a good time watching a movie and these totally made that happen.

On the subject of Speilberg, what did people think of Disclosure Day?

It was very Speilbergy, and there's lots to appreciate about that. But ultimately I just think its a film out of time.

Spoiler

Spoiler

The idea that, at the end of the film, every person in the world is tuning into a fucking news broadcast is one of the most ridiculous things I've seen on screen in a long time. It sadly just made Steven feel like the most out of touch, blindly optimistic, old guy in the business. And I have to agree with some of the reviews that have an issue with it being called Disclosure Day, when it's really about everything up to the point of Disclosure Day. I would have been so, vastly more interested to see the fallout of what was ultimately shared, rather than just hearing different characters speculate on it in, again, a rather outdated way. Kind of sad all round for me, unfortunately. And I think you're absolutely right that he's done it so much better before, himself!

And, finally, I've just started watching Yellowjackets after wanting to for such a long time. I'm loving it so far. Only a few episodes in but super excited to see how the story unravels.

Oh, and quick shout out to the new Spider-Man. Best looking superhero movie in ages, and while it certainly can be argued that it pulls a little too heavily on the 'greatest hits' of past Peter Parker outings - at least it does it well and it's not an entire 2 and half hours of Tom in front of a green screen. The choreography is great, story is interesting, it's funny and charming and heart warming in all the right places, and, Ima say my new catchphrase one last time, I had so much fun at the cinema watching this!