#148: Mile 22: (2018)

Odd action movie that is extremely interested in blowing your mind, man. Quite to my own surprise, I liked the switch between the crazy action and the calm control center, but the big twist at the end really doesn’t work if you spend 20 seconds thinking about it. Ultimately I think they tried to hard to differentiate it from a typical shoot-em-up and actually would’ve been much better if they just ran with it conventionally. Makes it into the recommendation zone because Rhonda Rousy was surprisingly excellent as an extra hard badass, (unfortunately they killed her off halfway through). And the guy from The Raid: Redemption was of course tremendous.

#147: Election (2005)

Good action sequences, but the plot didn’t really land for me – I get the basic thrust of everyone being out for themselves and ignoring the all-important yakuza codes and all, but then why is getting the goddamn baton so important and why does Big D suddenly just give up starting a competing crime family because the other guy got it?  If the codes don’t mean anything then why does getting the symbolic baton still carry so much weight? And then the ending doesn’t really make sense.  The characters just didn’t feel like actual characters to me.

#146: Thursday Movie Club (2025)

Nice sweet little movie with delightfully low stakes. Ultimately feels more like a nice pilot episode introducing our characters – I will be shocked if there isn’t basically one of these a year for a while.  Mirren and Brosnan have done this sort of thing a lot, and they’re pros, but Kingsley was really great and so much fun to watch.

#145: Punch-Drunk Love (2002)

It really, really hurt my estimation of this movie that I saw it shortly after Past Lives, Frances Ha, and Worst Person in the World, all of which covered ground very similar to this movie and considerably better and in a more watchable manner. This was Sandler’s big dramatic breakthrough, and he’s fine here but nowhere near as good as he is in Uncut Gems.

I think that ultimately I’m just not always on Paul Thomas Anderson’s wavelength. This just barely worked for me (I kind of got Barry’s darkness but I didn’t get his crazy and I definitely did’t get his asshole sisters or why Lena is into him), same with Licorice Pizza, I’m lower on There Will Be Blood than anyone else I know, The Master (#167!) wasn’t really my thing…but then again, Phantom Thread was awesome and we won’t be seeing One Battle After Another for quite some time on this list.

In any event, my problem with this one is that at it’s core this movie is trying to be a love story but it gives us no reason at all why Naomi Watts’s character likes this guy – honestly she’s not even really a character – the phone sex worker and Phillip Seymour Hoffman minor characters are given more interiority (and that stuff and the general quality of the performances is what carries it this high). Her character is just “love interest” and it’s very dissatisfying.

#144: Let’s Start a Cult (2024)

Cute flick with a solid premise: a guy is so annoying that the cult leader doesn’t even want him around for when the all drink the kool-aid but then he runs into the leader later and ropes him into starting a new cult. The only problem is that the main character is really, really annoying, which caps how high this can go up, but most of the rest of the characters are fun and there are a lot of nice little detail moments.

#143 Mickey 17 (2025)

Very watchable and the Mickey 17 character is a lot of fun, but it’s odd that they don’t really explore the implications of the “printing” technology beyond a (very good) printing joke and some of the total basics that they couldn’t help but cover. But really they just focus on standard stuff with the aliens and the Trump parody. They really could’ve done something so much more interesting and it’s a little frustrating that they didn’t. Worst though, and it’s not their fault, is that the Trump stuff really falls flat when he’s busy destroying our freaking country. So there’s that.

Up Next: More Good But Not Too Good Movies

And we are finally on the other side of the line. Everything from here on I would recommend, or even if I would not suggest you watch it, it’s at least too good to put it down with the “bad movies”. (This last is the When Evil Lurks codicil – I would never ever suggest that someone watch it, but it’s really incredibly well created.)

So, if Nosferatu is just below the line, what is just above it?

#154: Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum (2018)

Decent twist on a not particularly original concept – bunch of kids go “investigate” the old abandoned asylum, but this time they’re live-streaming it. Just spooky enough, but ultimately the premise keeps it from being particularly spooky or interesting as we kept bouncing around viewpoints and livecams and reaction shots and such instead of bringing coherent lingering scares. Some nice bits though.

#153: Den of Thieves 2: Pantera (2025)

Perfectly cromulent heist/crime flick, but a pale imitation of the first one. Butler’s schtick, which was pretty fun originally is more over the top and gets tiresome here, and the twists that were surprising or at least entertaining are now highlighted well in advance. Good thing the action sequences are pretty good.

#152: Arcadian (2024)

Okay, so the picture is really from the flick but it does make this movie (which is kinda stupid) look much stupider than it actually is. You normally only see them in short glimpses and such.

Anyway, it’s an odd little post-apocalyptic movie with weirdass hairy ostrich monsters, but really it’s about families and brothers and sacrifice (although, speaking of sacrifice, there was absolutely no reason for oddly muted Nic Cage to sacrifice himself and it added nothing to the plan whatsoever for him to do so). Not the horror movie that I wanted but not bad and at least the monsters really were original.

#151: Yacht Rock: A DOCKumentary (2024)

Nice, more or less interesting, but you know from the title whether or not you’re interested in seeing this. The Christopher Cross and Michael McDonald and Toto interviews were pretty fun.  Really enjoyed Kenny Loggins – there is a dude who is just happy to have had a great ride and is enjoying the heck out of his life now.

#150: The Blackening (2022)

Love love love the tagline. Otherwise pretty cute and funny, even if the identity of the “real” bad guy is obvious from the instant you meet him. I am obviously not the target audience for this but I enjoyed it well enough.

#149: Maxxxine (2024)

Good, but the least of the trilogy in my opinion. On the plus side, the opening title sequence is great, Kevin Bacon is TREMENDOUS, the soundtrack is killer (heh heh), and, uh, I don’t think I’ve ever seen that particular kind of murder before. For the minuses, you have to remember a lot of details from Pearl, and the bad guy reveal was….stupid?

Up Next: More Good Ones!

Ok ok ok, gotta step it up – there will still be 154 movies left to rank after I finish this. But these are the last movies I would not recommend so after this we get to the ones I actually liked! Hooray!

#161: Code 46 (2003)

You can tell it’s going to be a good movie when it starts with a recital of regulations. I guess this is better than trade boycotts?

In any event, it’s some interesting world building (and a cool score) and the best thing about it is trying to figure out how the near future is different from our reality. But it’s ultimately brought down by what I assume are deliberately flat performances from the leads – I think the idea was that everyone has to hide their inferiority from the authoritarian government, but it made it very hard to get into feeling for the characters.

#160 Sansho the Bailiff (1954)

This is apparently extremely important historically, but it was ultimately just too melodramatic to be that affecting now. The moral is extremely important and resonant with me – treat people the way you would want to be treated, be considerate and merciful – but it just didn’t really land with me. I think I may just be bad at connecting with older international movies?

#159: Evil Does Not Exist (2023)

Beautifully shot but has none of the emotional resonance of Hamaguchi’s prior movie (Drive My Car). Starting the picture with a long scene of a town meeting about a proposed glamping development that was less dynamic and interesting than actual town meetings that I have attended representing developers…..was a choice. Overall it’s more of an intellectual exercise, and while there are some benefits of that approach there needs to be something there for me to care about to hang it on – in theory the payoff at the end would’ve been staggering but all I could do is say “oh I see what they did there that’s nice.”

#158: Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others) (2006)

Really not sure how to feel about this. We spent the first 30ish minutes of this learning what a scumbag zealot our main character is. Although unlike others he is not casually cruel but appears to be a true believer in the (evil, authoritarian) cause, but then he changes for reasons that are unclear – does he suddenly believe in art? Does he fall in love with the woman he has been spying on? Does he love the idea of her and her compatriot for some reason? Does he realize that what he is doing is wrong? That the state is wrong? I feel like we’re missing some sort of conversion scene but maybe this is more like real life – change is gradual and then all of a sudden. He has certainly been indoctrinated for most of his life so maybe it is just now occurring to him for some reason? Or maybe he comes to see her as a person and gets sicker of the abuses? Maybe the whole point is that we should think about these things? Anyway it’s really well done but the bad guys are obviously evil (I mean it’s a whole system of obviously evil bad guys, it’s not really a complaint – I mean it’s not like I am going to get mad about people pointing out how evil the current administration is). Just not sure what we’re supposed to get out of his conversion.

#157: A Separation (2011)

Speaking of evil authoritarian regimes….Good lord, this is just pure misery porn – a bunch of people trying to do the best they can in terrible situations with no way out and completely unsympathetic “legal system” (that does not actually merit that term) and no good answers or hope for anything better – even when it looks like there might be a little way out, it goes wrong and everyone ends up worse off. Pure depression, just people getting beaten down over and over. This high because it’s very well done and it’s always good to shine a light on this stuff, but….yikes man. Not a fun watch.

#156: Flight Risk (2025)

Perfectly cromulent action thriller. Michele Thackerey with a flawless American accent Mark Wohlberg as a great bald creepo (with a really bad skull cap). Nothing special but a solid “I want an action movie this Saturday afternoon” experience. Is it a better movie than the prior two? Definitely not, but it’s a vastly more enjoyable experience and that’s enough to move it just past them.

#155: Noferatu (2024)

I normally don’t plan the order of these things and just do it by sorting and looking over the list over and over but I have known for a while that this was going to be my last “under the line” movie. I love Eggars’s work but this is his low point for me – like much of the above I found most of the characters to be not compelling. Count Orlock is presumably supposed to be so alien that he can’t be related to but making his motivations inscrutable really hurts a story that is supposed to be about an immortal (and immoral!) love.

The movie looks incredible, as always for Eggars, and Lily-Rose Depp is shockingly good but the inability to understand Orlock is just too much for the movie to get past.

Up Next: OMFG Movies I Actually Liked and Would Recommend! And I Don’t Have to Find Another Dark Tower Picture!

#168: The Accountant 2 (2025)

The high point is definitely the interaction between the brothers, which is nice but not saccharine. They are deeply missing Anna Kendrick from the first one – she really made it work more and you realize how much by what is really lacking here.

I almost picked a “That’s Not How Autism Works” gif for the picture, but honestly the Super Autism is pretty amazing – as a comics kid growing up it didn’t bother me that they were basically superpowered, and the crazy “head injuries can give you special abilities” thing is no more ridiculous than “radioactive spider bite.” I certainly don’t begrudge anyone who is offended, but it was just more silliness for me.

One thing that did really bug me that is more and more of a trend in these kinds of decent-not-good movies is the bad videogamization of battles – here, once the brothers show up to the insanely well-defended childrens’ camp, there is absolutely zero reason why they would keep going on the “get the kids in the bus and drive them to the pit” plan other than dramatic tension to give the plot a ticking clock. Focus on the people trying to kill you! Who the $@%^ cares if the plan with the kids gets pulled off if you’re going to be dead? Either kill the brothers who are murdering all of you first then you have time or get the F out of there and run for it and who cares about the plan? Frustrating.

#167: The Master (2012)

Probably my least favorite PSH performance to date, possibly because what I love is how he makes his characters so authentic but this guy is a master charlatan manipulator so he feels inherently inauthentic. Phoenix is great but he’s just so damaged that it’s hard to figure if he’s insane or mentally disabled or shell shocked from the war or what. The relationship between Freddie and the Master is interesting but not particularly compelling – Master loves Freddie becuase he’s his most irrationally devoted follower, and Freddie loves Master because he fills the void he needs for direction and a father figure. it was fine? I do wonder if L Ron could’ve sued and won – it’s so very clearly based on Scientology, but of course he would not want to admit that given the portrayal here.

#166: The Monkey (2025)

Ultimately pretty stupid excuse for a bunch of gore.  Still recognizably an Osgood Perkins joint, so it’s not like it was bad and there was a fun attitude, but it was kind of a lesser Final Destination gimmick.  Also, while I normally like it when horror shows don’t explain everything about the Big Bad Thing, having your evil be a cutesy wind up monkey and then never having the slightest hint or clue about why or how or anything about it is kind of a cop out.

#165: Remember the Titans (2000)

I mean, Denzel is always good and it’s a perfectly cromulent sports drama and moral arc but I just have a problem with movie like this. Hooray! The horrible racists learned the value of acceptance! Of course they never suffer from their misdeeds and have no adverse consequences for their actions, so everyone wins, yay!

#164: Under the Skin (2013)

I wanted to like it, and I didn’t hate it – I mean this is original science fiction, man! And ScarJo is definitely one of our best and most under-appreciated actors. But this is wayyyy too ponderous, man. Like, this was a solid short story, maybe a novella, stretched way the hell out to movie length. Give me a break man. Although I have to admit that infamous beach scene with the family is indeed chilling as hell.

#163: Superbad (2007)

So weird – in a way it’s two different movies – half of it, including the first 30 minutes, are really really rough. Like, down with Rush Hour 2 and V/H/S Halloween. You can tell that this script was written by 14 year old boys for 14 year old boys, and it has the gender politics to show for it. BUT! Then you have Bill Hader and Seth Rogan as cops with McLovin and I just adored every single freaking thing about that half of the movie – which of course was almost entirely ad libbed. Hader is a genius, and this could be near the top on its own. Apparently there is a 34 minute DVD extra of more of them ad libbing stuff that doesn’t appear to be streaming anywhere, but I think I need it?

#162: Cidade de Deus (2002) [City of God]

I dunno, maybe it’s because it was pretty poverty porny, maybe because it was insanely ridicidulously violent (I’m guessing, conservatively, that 300 people were shot to death in the course of the movie, including the execution of a sub-10-yr-old child and the ultimate criminal takeover by a child gang and a psychopathic 8 year old) and it was just a bit much. It wasn’t bad but there just was not much happening aside from a whole lotta lotta lotta murder.

Up Next: The Last Group of Movies Under the Line! Hallelujah!

Oh, right right right, we’re still doing this. Got it.

#174: Miami Blues (1990)

Weird little action….comedy (?) about a psychopathic criminal who is not very good at being a criminal who falls in love…I think?… with a disturbingly young Jennifer Jason Leigh…and is pursued by a cop who is also not very good at his job? Good cast that isn’t sure exactly what kind of movie they are in, which keeps it from being either weird or straight enough to actually be good.

#173: Opus (2025)

Eh? I like what it was trying to do but it comes off as just an excuse for Malcovich to be eccentricly weird. And don’t get me wrong, he is great at that – one of the absolute best there ever was at it (under Walken but ahead of Cage I’d say). The two singles – actually sung by Malkovich – are great, but the script really needed to be better for this to work the way it wanted to.

#172: Didn’t Die (2025)

Nice lead performance from Kiran Deol as someone trying to keep it together in a zombie apocalypse. Unfortunately the movie takes itself too seriously, beginning with an unneeded decision to film in black and white. But there really is nothing trenchant here, just some solid relationship work. Also, why do I keep forgetting that I don’t like zombie movies?

#171: Heretic (2024)

Comparative Religion 201: The Movie

#170: Frankenstein (2025)

I think I just don’t get del Toro? This was beautiful to look at and with two glaring exceptions the acting was good but the story seemed lifeless? I cannot believe that they actually had William tell Victor “you are the monster” when that was already clearly the entire thrust of the book, the movie, everything. My goodness.  Mia Goth is given nothing to do, just a reactive character with motivations that never seem real, but even at that never seems like a consistent person. Oscar Isaac is pretty good when he is consumed with the madness of ambition but honestly pretty bad at all other moments. The ending of the plot makes no sense either – “You Must Kill Me! I’m going to run away now!” What? And then he chases Victor? What is even?

#169: The Craft (1996)

So, like, totally 90s, with the 90s soundtrack, 90s casual racism (by a bad guy to be sure) and 90s casual misogency (by everyone including our heros) and focus on weird mispronounced deities. Oh and you can totally see all the ways that it’s all going to go wrong way way way in advance…..just like a 90s movie. Way cheesier than its cool goth reputation, but solid fun despite the silly script and bad F/X. I will say though, the original 3 turned on Sarah super quick and super hard for no discernible reason – just chill out, ladies, and rule the world as a collective!

#168: [rec] 2 (2009)

Perfectly serviceable sequel to a true horror classic, but unlike the first one it feels like a first person shooter. Lots of jump scares but no time to build any suspense, which was the true brilliance of the original. Still fun but not a chew-your-arm-off-to-avoid-the-tension scarefest.

Up Next: We’re Getting There, I Promise!

#181: Wolf Man (2025)

Oh good another movie about generational trauma. I’m the plus side, naming the daughter Ginger was a nice nod to the classic Ginger Snaps. Somewhat interesting to show half the movie from the wolf’s perspective but it doesn’t really add that much. Not interesting enough to really make the remake worthwhile.

#180: Thunderbolts* (2025)

Pugh and Harbour are great and every moment the film spends with them is fantastic. I yield to no man in my appreciation of Ms. Pugh. Unfortunately the JLD stuff doesn’t really work, although she gives a good performance. And then there is the situation with Bob. Look, the Thunderbolts work because they solve ground level problems not world threatening supervillains and they kinda sorta try to get around that but still. Can we not have lesser stakes anymore? Also, can we not have every goddamn super hero and horror movie really be about depression? Bonus points for the post-credits David Brooks slam shown above.

#179: End of Days (1999)

Extremely 90s but not in a particularly good way – action gunfights over the plot making sense, big explosions, etc. Byrne is around 75% as good a Satan as Pacino, which is high praise, but he is not well served by the script, which treats him as a supervillain with inconsistent power levels instead of crafty and sinister and praying on humanity’s own worst impulses. Not not fun but overall kind of meh despite a more modulated than usual performance from Ahnold.

#178: Fallen (1998)

Far too slow in pace, and for a movie that relies on various twists and reveals they are all FAR too telegraphed. A Denzel movie should be better. He is great in it, of course. Although, I have to admit that this is one of the vanishingly rare times where my least favorite cinematic crutch – starting with a scene then going back to tell the story that led up to it – is actually used to add something to the tale. So against my better judgment I have bumped it up for that.

#177: The Red Shoes (1948)

Chicks be crazy, man.

This is supposedly about the sacrifices one faces to be a good artist, but (at least through modern eyes) it is really about the inhumanity of the two male leads – one thoughout the movie who demands total sacrifice for art but as far as I can tell has no actual artistic role himself whatever – he heads the company but he’s not a director, I guess he’s the finance guy? (And I know finance people in the theatre and they are proud of supporting the arts but they do not think of themselves as artists.) And then the loving supportive guy makes a grand romantic gesture but demands that she immediately come with him, she is not to be allowed a single performance, she has to come with him now now now or else he will.leave her forever. Of course she then goes insane and throws herself off a cliff. Suuuuuuure OK. I think I may just have a problem with older films that are more allegorical – the characters are just not realistic enough in their motivations for my sensibilities. I will admit that the extended ballet sequence is pretty awesome though.

#176: Slice (2018)

There was something here that didn’t get fully realized – oddly detailed worldbuilding that was never explained just lived in, which was great. Unfortunately, the movie was more interested in being cute than in having, you know, a plot that made sense or anything. We never even really found out why delivery people were being killed – it was much more interesting when there was a whole assembled underground association of delivery people but they lost interest in that quickly too. Another few rewrites and it could have been great (or maybe just worse, who knows).

#175: Y Tu Mama Tambien (2001)

I dunno man I just don’t dig stories about oversexed alpha assholes fighting about having slept with each other’s girlfriends and doing drugs and shit. Just not my scene. Also, I’m not sure what was going on with the various side notes of protests and political unrest. Never actually explored and not sure what was intended by showing and occasionally noting it. Maybe that was the point? Maybe the point is that this is really a story about Luisa even though it is told from the perspective of the boys?

Up Next: Don’t Worry, We Will Get Through This Tier of Movies Together

#188: The Postcard Killings (2020)

Per my notes, this was ”adequate but overblown, with a decent bait and switch that is resolved too soon.” I do not actually remember anything else about this, so I put it here as a compromise and out of respect for Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

#187: Spencer Confidential (2020)

Extremely formulaic but surprisingly well acted, especially Alan Arkin (duh) and Iliza Shlesinger. Not something you have to pay close attention to – if you walked out of the room for a couple of scenes you would know right where things were picking up when you came back.

#186: Coming Home in the Dark (2021)

Boy oh boy do I not recommend this….so I will spoil it (kinda) and tell you that the bad guys murder the two boys early on and not in a nice way at all (not that being nice about it would be any better). Having said that, the tension on this is ramped all the way up in a highly realistic and terrifying way for a good 90 minutes. So while I would definitely not recommend it, it’s not actually bad per se.

#185: Ripley’s game (2002)

As we all know, it can be dangerous to see a movie after reading the book, especially if it’s in close proximity. I love the Ripley books (although learn from me children – do not learn about the life and personal beliefs of Patricia Highsmith), but this movie removes all of the ambiguity; it’s extremely frustrating.  Malkovich is a good Ripley but not perfect – too cold, too calculating, too deliberate; he’s no Andrew Scott (#1) or Matt Damon (#1A).

#184: Synchronic (2019)

Decent idea but disappointingly sensible and straightforward in execution – right when it’s needed, an expert comes in to Explain Exactly What Is Going On and is, of course, completely correct about everything. I hate that! Why??? It’s my second-biggest movie pet peeve (after “one month earlier” and the like). Benson and Moorhead (who brought us, among other things, the wonderfully inexplicable The Endless) are normally beyond such things so I assume it was mandated for this bigger-than-usual-for-them production. Anyway, it’s fine, even if everything ends up being too convenient and the plot twists are obvious from a mile away. I demand justice for Hawking!!!

#183: Hard Eight (1996)

I didn’t get it. Philip Baker Hall is perfect but I never felt like the characters were doing things for understandable reasons – very unusual for a PTA film. And I definitely didn’t get whatever was going on with Clementine….what? It gets this high for Hall alone.

#182: Murder at 1600 (1997)

Man, remember when Wesley Snipes was a movie star? Those were the days.

This is a perfectly adequate movie of its type, even if all of the twists were completely obvious from 10 minutes in or less. Snipes had some impressive physical moves in his fight scenes that were clearly him and not a stunt double, which was nice, and he worked his charisma throughout – too bad about the tax cheat business

Up Next: Look, I watched a lot of movies last year and this is the middle of the bell curve. I promise we’ll get to good movies soon.

#195: Psych 3: This Is Gus (2021)

Psych is one of my favorite shows – not a show that I think is particularly great, but such a fun show and one that always felt like everyone involved in it was having such a great time, and it did all the little things right. Anyway, this is my way of saying that I really can’t remember anything about this movie per se. I know I had a good enough time watching it, but I would only recommend it to someone who really loved the tv show.

#194: Slender Man (2018)

Basically decent if formulaic creature horror. I will say that it’s shockingly easy to summon the Slender Man – so many kids should be so very dead if SM really shows up that easily. The characters are very iffy in their motivations and characterizations – the one “normal” friend being all like “sure Katie has been missing ever since that profane dark magic midnight ceremony in the forest, and Chloe sure seems to be a zvumbie now but I have track practice now, so…” doesn’t seem very believable.

#193: In a Violent Nature (2024)

Good idea – a Friday the 13th style movie shot from the perspective of the unlikable evil behemoth. Unfortunately, nothing else about this is particularly interesting or original. The victim kids are boring and annoying – I assume on purpose, but it made it much easier to just root for kills without examining what we’re doing or being conflicted at all about it. The kills were extremely gory, but not actually any fun? So overall it gets this high for concept but don’t watch unless you’re a big horror person.

#192: Bugonia (2025)

Probably the most frustrating movie I saw in 2025. If you are interested in seeing this but haven’t yet, skip the next paragraph.

If they had just played it straight, I would have loved it – there was some really solid work here, and the last turn before they ruined everything was brilliant. But nooooooo, Yorgos just had to go and have her be an alien, and not just that but have him be exactly right about everything even down to the drawing of the ship, which is just stupid and not at all ironic or funny or deep but just plain stupid. So frustrating! They could have even had her be an alien just have him still be completely wrong and then it would have been annoying but still how did the stupid idiot figure out that she’s an alien haha, but nooooooo. Went from an A- to a C+ in five poorly thought-out minutes.

#191: Your Monster (2024)

Fun weird little movie with a HUGE tonal shift out of the blue at the end that totally shook me out of it.

What? Sometimes I don’t have too much to say about a movie. It happens!

#190: Spirited Away (2001)

As previously discussed, I am an inhuman monster who just cannot find these Studio Ghibli movies charming and fun. Like, I get that they’re incredibly inventive, which I appreciate, and they supposedly simulate childlike wonder, but I just don’t get it. Maybe it’s because I’m not a huge fan of the animation style? In any case, the “plot” (such as it is) of this one didn’t land for me at all. It was fine? I preferred Totoro.

#189: The Gorge (2025)

Two very different movies – the first half is actually a really nice relationship / romance tale, while the second half is a pretty lame and silly sci-fi “thriller” with nonsense monsters fighting against guns with infinite bullets. Perfect Reznor score – really well done there, loved the industrial aspects, extremely tense. The leads were both great in the parts of the movie where they were allowed to act, as opposed to running from CGI.

Up Next: I think we have 2 more sets of these and then we’re on to films I actually liked! Hooray!

#202: The Deliverance (2024)

So I obviously decided to watch this as part of my ongoing search for good new horror movies, but it turned out to be a pretty decent family drama instead. Unfortunately it ultimately fell into a standard demonic-possession Christianity drama, allegedly based on a true story. Ooof. Glenn Close makes a surprisingly good turn as a fun sexy grandma though.

#201: Escape Room (2019)

Decent idea with good practical F/X underdone by an utterly predictable script. Among other issues, it suffers from the terrible infuriating inescapable moronic plague trend of showing us almost the end and then cutting to “three days earlier.” Also, the way they set up the premise is pretty ridiculous – I get why some of these people might take the bait, but for others it’s obviously not interesting or worth it and would seem like a ridiculous scam – yet no one is ever actually close to walking away when some of them would obviously never have even shown up to this thing in the first place. If you can’t figure out why your characters would agree to do the thing, then maybe try rewrites? And of course there was absolutely no way for the bad guys to know half (or more) of the stuff they knew just because the plot wanted them to.

#200: Dr. Detroit (1983)

Sorry, Claire. This was fun in an extremely specific 80’s kind of way and I can see how if I had seen this in ‘83 when I was 13 I might have really loved it, but watching it in 2025 was asking me to accept a bit too much in terms of what is still funny instead of cringy. Some great lines though.

#199: Clown in a Cornfield (2025)

Pretty much what it says on the tin. The leads were quite good (particularly Vincent Muller and Katie Douglas) and there were some good moments, but it needed to be at least 25% more clever instead of just resting on its laurels about being a movie about a clown….in a cornfield….killing people.

#198: The Frighteners (1996)

This had so much potential, especially with a good Michael J. Fox performance. It’s still not bad, but the rules about how the ghosts work and what they can do change constantly based on script needs, and non-MJF character actions are essentially determined by a random number generator. Also, we see the murdered people essentially going to heaven which kind of dulls the whole impact of the deaths? Oh no! Not my eternal reward! Anything but that!

#197: Train Dreams (2025)

Beautifully shot and lovingly acted but just so so sad – basically trauma porn. Too much horrible stuff to bear for me. If you can handle a ton of terrible things happening to a basically decent man (I understand he’s much more complicated in the book but he’s almost wholly without fault in the movie), then I would recommend this, but it was not for me.

#196: Until Dawn (2025)

Mostly by-the-numbers video game slasher, although there are some parts that are that better than they had to be (don’t drink the water!). The premise would be tiresome but they openly mock it pretty well so that makes it more bearable.  Unfortunately, they feel compelled to try to explain everything and….well….no. Doesn’t make sense and is frankly pretty stupid.

Up Next: More Not Quite Good Enough

So we have moved on to one of the biggest categories on the bell curve – the films that are just under the line for me to recommend them. These are not actually good, but they’re not really bad. Often there is a quality idea with subpar execution, sometimes underbaked concepts, sometimes just bad performances in key roles. These movies don’t need to be publicly flogged, but they should be disappointed in themselves.

#209: Till Death (2021)

Mildly intriguing concept, done in such a way as to avoid making it interesting at all – at each point they made the choice that would be the most mainstream blah – the husband is not conflicted but is so loathsome that we are actively rooting for his death well before it comes. And Meghan Fox isn’t nearly a good enough actor to make us interested in whether or not her character survives. On the low end of “fine.”

Also… “Till” Death? With two L’s? Until only has 1 L. Clean up your damn act, movie.

#208: Dangerous Minds (1995)

Oh good, a white savior movie! We definitely always need more of those! Pfeiffer does her best but the plot has zero surprises, on top of the whole…you know…white savior issue. Best thing to come from this is the great Gangsta’s Paradise (which itself led to the classic Amish Paradise, obviously).

#207: Casper (1995)

Cute in its way, but too many yikes moments to really get it over the line. Everyone being instructed to overact as much as possible was certainly a choice, although boy did Eric Idle phone it in.

#206: Touch Me (2026?)

Really respect what they were going for here – roughly speaking, A comedic, silly sci-fi story about self-improvement and tentacle porn. The effects, particularly the, um, tentacles are ridiculously low-fi in a mostly fun way and the morning workouts (see above) were amazing.

Unfortunately, they don’t really do anything with the concept. It’s cute but there really is nothing there outside of the inherent humorousness of the whole tentacle thing and a few other nice bits.

Saw this at Sundance, which was definitely the right setting for it, but I don’t think it’s been picked up yet. Not a good sign.

#205: Enigma (2025)

Very interesting documentary about an earlier transgender French community and cabaret culture, but the movie just would not shut up with all the “And you’re trans right?  Right?  Right?” Way too much. And the interviewer inserted herself too much into the movie for my taste; I don’t require a Errol Morris Interrotron for every documentary but this level of involvement made it more about the filmmaker than I cared for, particularly in light of all the nagging of the poor subject about something she clearly didn’t want to directly address.

#204: Kraven the Hunter (2024)

Shockingly not terrible! Much better than the other bad Sony marvel movies, but, you know, that doesn’t mean that it’s actually good. There was some bad acting (particularly Ariana DuBose, but nobody is going to have this on their personal clip roll), not great plotting (plenty of weird character flip flops), but there were some good fight scenes, it generally made sense, and nobody struggled and failed repeatedly to open a can of Pepsi.

#203: Havoc (2025)

Not bad, but bitterly disappointing from the writer/director of The Raid 2. The high point is obviously the action sequences, but even then it’s hard to suspend my disbelief when every gun apparently has a clip of 427 bullets. Really, you should just skip to the big fight scenes at 0:53 and 1:14.

It’s also unclear how we are supposed to be feel about the supposed antihero who it turns out wasn’t actively involved in the really bad stuff from the past that his “friends” keep talking about him being involved in, and isn’t actually a bad guy. At the end Hardy makes the appropriate point that Olyphant is the only one left that has anything on him, then they shoot it out and he kills Olyphant, then his partner shows up and says “what now?” And he says “now you arrest me” and I’m like what? You just pointed out that there is nobody left to tell on you! Why would you be arrested? And if it’s for the big shootout then the partner should be just as arrested! What???

Up Next: Are You Kidding? We Haven’t Even Hit 200 Yet?