
#49: Carry-On (2025)

Quality suspense thriller elevated by Jason Bateman as villain, with particularly impressive voice work.
#48: Black Bag (2025)

Shockingly cerebral (in that it’s really smart but doesn’t have much of an emotional pulse) for a movie that supposedly hinges on a married couple and several dating couples. But I found it compelling to follow the mysteries and see what is going on even though it cheats a little (in that we often don’t have enough information) but I was never mad at it about that if that makes sense – it’s just not one where you can figure out the movie in advance. But it was crafty and witty and very enjoyable on that level. I think Fassbender only plays spies now?
#47: Novocaine (2025)

I love a movie that takes the time to do the little stuff right –
“Is that one of the robbers?”
“Hope so. It’d be a shame if it was the real Santa.”
And I’m on record as being a big part of the Jack Quaid Army. He really is the best, nepo baby or not. And the plot is better than it has any right to be too.
#46: Borderline (2025)

What a fabulous silly little trifle of a nonsense movie. Really great performances by everyone too. Samara Weaving is excellent, Eric Dane is just exactly the right amount of serious with just a tiny little bit of winking, the actress playing Penny (Alba Baptista) is really really great in her insanity, Rhodes (Jimmy Fails) is shockingly loveable, just big big fun, way to go everyone.
#45: Final Destination: Bloodlines (2025)

Has a lot of fun with it. The Julia death was particularly amazeballs. And all the setups were great and it’s just so much fun. And the characters are so well realized in a movie where they really didn’t have to be. Every single moment is treated like life or death – walking through the revolving door – SCARY!!! So much better than it needed to be. And the perfect ending. I feel bad that I couldn’t rank it higher but this was a pretty stacked year.
#44: Brokeback Mountain (2005)

Yeah, come on, like I have anything to add to this discourse. Beautiful and tragic.
#43: Secret in Their Eyes (2015)

Holy fuck that was dark as shit! Mad respect to Julia Roberts for playing the most unglamorous character possible – total depression, all-consuming grief, no markup, bad haircut, no glam, no nothing. Especially brave with Nicole Kidman in your movie! Really well done.
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