Today I'm celebrating 1,000 episodes of Scott's Self-Indulgent Movie Podcast with 30 second reviews submitted by you!
Listen at the podcast providers of your choice.
Movies
Alanna
Ghostbusters 2016
The backlash against this movie was sexist horseshit. If this movie wasn't a reboot/sequel to a beloved movie starring men, one that all three living leads from the original appear in, it would probably be viewed with the same affection as Paul Feig's other comedies including The Heat and Spy. Kate McKinnon runs away with the movie, Chris Hemsworth is infuriatingly funny, the effects work holds up remarkably well and the cast chemistry and comedic vibes are more than strong enough to overcome any narrative shortcomings.
If you hate this movie, your should ask yourself why.
Rebecca
Crossroads
A pop star who had to grow up too fast in the public eye attempting to branch out with a coming-of-age road trip movie sounds like it should work. Some light fun with some up and coming talent including Oscar-winner Zoe Saldana. So why is this movie so depressing? The script from future TV juggernaut Shonda Rhimes proves that Rhimes' heightened melodrama works best in TV featuring adults, because in a movie about a trio of girls road-tripping together, what is ideally a series of little life lessons quickly turns in a horror movie with a pop rock soundtrack.
Newt
Lucky Number Slevin
If you took all of the neo-noir indie crime movies of the 90s and 2000s and put them in a blender, you'd get something like Lucky Number Slevin. We've got an enigmatic lead performance from Josh Hartnett, guys with names like "The X" and a rotating series of moves and countermoves with a silent but deadly Bruce Willis in the wings. While the end result doesn't quite deliver on its promise, it's darkly funny crime comedy vibes and stacked cast help the script and movie punch above it's weight. Familiar but fun.
Rebecca
Sorry to Bother You
Boots Riley absurdist take of the working class experience under capitalism takes one massive swing after another, be it a plot twist, a visual flourish, a scene setup or the reveal of the individual "white voices." Lakeith Stanfield is perfectly cast as a telemarketer who works his way up the corporate ladder as personal compromises and proof that he's working for the bad guys piles up. Intentionally inflammatory, often hilarious, never boring, easily one of my favorite films of the last ten years. A movie that only gets more relevant since its release.
Deanna
Pride & Prejudice and Zombies
The fun with a fan-fiction ass premise like this one is the juxtaposition. Our baseline tone is a period romantic drama full of manners, pointed glances, and aching levels of emotional restraint. So flipping the script on that with martial arts zombie action is fertile ground for comedy and anarchic fun. But when the book it's based on features a more gruesome image than any that appear on screen because you decided to make your movie PG-13, you're in trouble. Considering the cast and premise this should at least be a bit of dumb fun. Instead it feels like a sanded down version of the original pitch.
Rebecca
The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2
Structurally there's not a vast difference between the first and second Traveling Pants movies. But content-wise it feels miles apart. While the first film dealt with a bevy of heavy topics including family rivalries, racism, terminal illness, and losing your virginity, almost all of the tension in the second film feels like standard teen girl drama topics like romance. It's not terrible, and the cast are just as charming as before, it's just strange for characters who are now older to be handling seemingly less adult topics when they're even closer to adulthood.
Newt
Galaxy Quest
The biggest tool in this movie's arsenal is sincerity. A sincere love for the silliness of science fiction, the actors who have been associated with beloved characters their entire careers, the overzealous fans, and even it's own meta premise of sci-fi actors being forced to be their characters in a real life or death scenario. The jokes all land, every setup is paid off, and even silly catchphrases land with added emotional weight by the film's end. A genuine comedy classic.
Rebecca
Last Night in Soho
Edgar Wright dives into the joy and danger of nostalgia through the lens of an aspiring designer. Thomasin McKenzie proves her star-making turn in Jojo Rabbit was no fluke and the dearly departed Diana Rigg delivers a fantastic final screen performance. While this movie lacks the frenetic energy of Wright's previous efforts (both visually and in action), as a celebration and deconstruction of Soho's "Swinging Sixties," told with the visual dream-like language of sixties and seventies horror cinema it works.
Deanna
Happiness for Beginners
I know everything that's "wrong" with this movie. It's predictable. Overly sentimental. A strange mix of an "Eat, Pray, Love" revitalize your life ethos blended with a rom-com with overly dramatic elements. Nothing we haven't seen before with only novelty being the premise which is a divorcee played by Ellie Kemper trying to reclaim her life on a hiking trip that turns unexpectedly dangerous and also might give her a shot at love again. I think it's cute, cozy and sweet.
Rebecca
I’m Still Here (aka Joaquin’s descent into madness)
This mockumentary has the vibe of multiple men giving into their worst impulses because it allegedly "says something" about celebrity. What they actually created is a cursed object that's actually more revealing about the excesses male creators can indulge in without garnering the same level of infamy or denigration as their female peers. Pair that with the prominent inclusion of P. Diddy and multiple allegations of on set harassment, and the only thing this movie leaves me with is the sour aftertaste of a bad frat party.
Newt
Ready or Not
Newt asked me to pick my favorite horror movie and Ready or Not is what came to mind. Mostly because I can't think of a horror movie that is this funny, this tense, and this incisive, in such a modest runtime. Samara Weaving delivers a star-making turn as our bride, Adam Brody gives perfect sad boy, and each line in this movie feels like it's trying to make you laugh, cry or say something. And without spoiling anything, one of the most satisfying payoffs in horror movie history. Proof that you can say something and still deliver a great time.
Rebecca
Honey I Shrunk the Kids
This is the kind of movie I wish more studios were making. A big family friendly adventure with a sci-fi ass premise. For those unfamiliar the movie follows a group of kids who are accidentally shrunk down to near microscopic levels after a mishap with their father's invention. The kids bond, make friends with an Ant (I promise I won't cry) and each get a moment to show their mettle, the parents bond and gain a newfound appreciation for their kids. Top to bottom crowd-pleaser.
Deanna
Armageddon
Even if your bread and butter is cheesy effects-driven disaster movies, you can do a lot better than this. Michael Bay's "giant asteroid coming to destroy earth movie," is so needlessly convoluted and silly that one of the most endearing things Ben Affleck ever did was rip the movie to shreds in the DVD commentary. It's too long, dumb in a dumb way, and over-the-top at all the wrong moments. The only worse mismatch between Michael Bay's filmmaking sensibilities and the story he's being asked to tell would be Bay's next movie, Pearl Harbor.
Rebecca
Spider-Man 3
When I tried to get in to a midnight showing for this movie for my birthday, the ticket taker wouldn't accept my online ticket purchase. In retrospect, they may have been trying to protect me. While the movie isn't as bad as its reputation, the whiplash from the ultimately hopeful first two films to this cynical and often mean-spirited third film spends most of its runtime wallowing in the worst impulses of all of its lead characters and makes all of the other irritant's (i.e. how many fight scenes where Peter has his mask off) stand out. Not sure if this was pure studio meddling or what, but the end result was a birthday letdown for the ages.
Hiran
Clerks
Clerks is best enjoyed through managed expectations. The production values are sparse. The acting is hit or miss. It's entirely reliant on dialogue. And it's central thesis of "don't slut shame your nice girlfriend," is certainly a product of its time. But the real appeal of the movie isn't the story, it's the "day in the life" experience that's just heightened and silly enough to feel like a real funny customer service or a bit of wish fulfillment (see Randall firing off a string of porn titles to a flabbergasted customer). As a snapshot of Gen-X malaise, fascination and frustrations through an hourly job, it's great.
Rebecca
War for the Planet of the apes
The conclusion to the new Apes trilogy plays out like a biblical fable as Caesar's group of apes searches for sanctuary in a rapidly deteriorating world. While it may lack the action-heavy heft of Dawn, the franchise's biggest weapon is the filmmakers' commitment to fleshing out all of its characters be they primate or human. The effects and motion capture performances remain stellar as the script tackles Caesar's possible decent into a Koba-like villain or Ape Moses while milking every standoff for maximum tension.
Jessica
National Lampoon's Xmas Vacation
Reviewing a beloved Christmas movie is fraught, especially when you didn't grow up watching it. For me, the films' chaotic and sometimes cynical vibe goes against my natural instinct for Christmas movies, which is sincerity and light-hearted silliness. But when your movie features a boss being captured and shamed for skimping out on a bonus he promised his workers as the stress of family gathering actually brings people together after days of tension, it's hard to be harsh.
Rebecca
Daredevil (2003)
When your movie can't decide if it's The Crow or Spider-Man it'll probably end poorly. The problem with this movie becomes readily apparent when you compare it to the much more successful Marvel TV show. Tone. While much of the movie aims for gothic intensity, its awkward forays into melodramatic romance, drastic shifts into comedy and poorly aged CGI in the action beats create an unintentionally funny movie that isn't in on the joke. None of which is the fault of the cast who all deliver charming or genre appropriate performances including a breakout villain role for Colin Farrell as Bullseye.
Rebecca
Leave the World Behind
Most apocalyptic movies emphasize destruction, chaos and the breakdown of society. Leave the World Behind stews in something else: uncertainty. We have two families cohabitating out of necessity as contact with the outside world evaporates and they try to piece together what's happening with slivers of information. The discomfort and dread is palpable and well acted by a cast of full of heavy hitters who are trying to find connection and reliable information in a literal and metaphorical dead zone. Not for everyone, but very effective.
Rebecca
Josie and the Pussycats
Both a box office bomb and cult favorite, Josie and the Pussycats doesn't fit neatly into either category for me. But as a guy who grew up watching Wayne's World, I'm all for high energy comedies that satirize the corporate entertainment machine via likable lead characters with a bunch of bouncy tunes in between. Especially when we have now resurgent actors as our villains (a deliciously vile duo of Parker Posey and Alan Cumming). Silly, but not dumb, fun.
Rebecca
The Menu
Ray Fiennes and company whip up something fun here with a delicious skewering of foodie culture that also fillets fanaticism, and bakes in class conflict. The movie marinates in darkly funny tension as a carefully rendered group of guests are treated to a five course meal of horrors from a renowned chef (Fiennes) and his cultish kitchen staff. We're roasting egos and deconstructing any art's ability to say something effectively with searing performances from Fiennes and Anya Taylor-Joy and the promise of a deadly dessert. Cooking pun
Rebecca
Kangaroo Jack
If you think this movie is horrible because it's a live-action comedy featuring a CGI kangaroo, you'd be right. But that's only the tip of shitty iceberg that is this abomination of a movie. Because not only is this a lazy action comedy that thinks it's on some kind of Looney Tunes wavelength, it's also cruder and more violent than you'd ever expect and something that shocked many of the parents who brought their kids, only to hear a Kangaroo make sex jokes. Wrong-headed in every regard. A textbook case of false advertising. Avoid to maintain your mental health.
Matt
Yoga Hosers
I have nothing nice to say about this movie. I was tempted to say "It's shit" and leave it at that. But the real problem with this movie is that it was made in a "yes, man" vacuum where no one could or would tell Smith that his jokes weren't funny, that the premise was potentially offensive or wouldn't work, or that maybe we should stop writing scripts while we're high. It's a low point for Smith, where all of his charms have been removed and all his flaws as a filmmaker have never been more obvious.
7 Days in Hell
Andy Samberg leads this sports mocumentary that is as funny as it is quick. Based on a real tennis match, that laset 11 hours over the course of three days, the audience is treated to a 30 for 30 style breakdown of "The Bad Boy of Tennis" (Samberg) and the near silent Charles Poole played by Kit Harrington as they battle each other for a week with a series of absurd escalating stunts. Imagine Never Stop Never Stopping energy, but a sports doc and you've got the right idea. And if you like this, you'll probably like their follow up Tour de Pharmacy.
Rebecca
Open Water 2: Adrift
The title of this movie is a lie. The original Open Water was a found footage horror movie where our two leads are stranded after scuba diving and forced to fend off sharks with no means of communicating for help. The second movie adopted Open Water in its title because the original movie was successful. There are no sharks. So if you really wanted to watch people slowly die in the ocean due to exhaustion, self-inflicted injuries and stupidity, this movie is for you. I think it's a callous cash grab that used the titled of a better more successful movie to trick audiences which means it should be purged with fire.
Rebecca
Spy
Melissa McCarthy goes from desk analyst to field agent in arguably the best team-up between McCarthy and director Paul Feig. There's a lot to like here whether it's a stacked cast including Jason Statham making fun of his entire career as McCarthy's rival agent, Rose Byrne being an absolute dickhead, and a scene-stealing Miranda Hart. But the main reasons to love it are Melissa McCarthy's satisfying arc of self-realization and the film's commitment to both aspects of the action comedy label.
Rebecca
Eragon
If you cast Jeremy Irons in a fantasy movie you can bet on two things. He'll be great and the movie will probably be shit. Picking a decisive "where things went wrong" with this movie feel like a fools' errand. The script is a collection of cliches in a trenchcoat. The action beats are boring. And the effects can't match the source material. Further proof that attempting to replicate the success of a popular franchise with one of your own should be done with care, not as a quick cash-in. Save yourself the 100 minutes and watch How to Train Your Dragon instead.
Rebecca
Teeth
A horror movie that also functions as a beginner's guide to consent? Yes please. What's so clever about Teeth is that its allegedly most monstrous element, a young woman named Dawn who has teeth in her vagina, is actually far less terrifying and villainous that the men that come into our hero orbit. A great inversion of tired tropes of women in horror that offers violent catharsis for anyone who's met men like this and takes great glee in dolling out their just rewards. Bold and sadly, very timely.
Rebecca
Tusk
Kevin Smith's fooray into body horror has its defenders. I'm not one of them. The film is basically a slow motion car crash as we watch Justin Long's podcast host be radically transformed over the course of the movie by a mad doctor who is obsessed with creating a human walrus. But unlike the torture porn or french extremist films it takes inspiration from, Tusk lacks the shock factor or thematic focus to justify its indulgences. The make up work is pretty solid, but this is ugly stuff.
Rebecca
Role Models
Paul Rudd and Sean William Scott are a great odd couple pair of coworkers who are forced into a "Big Brother" style mentorship program after a dustup with the law. There's a lot to like here where it's Rudd going full sarcastic misanthrope , Scott properly channeling his bro-dude delivery for a likable character, or a bevy of great side performances including Jane Lynch and Ken Jeong. But the movie's real magic is in mining its premise (two wildly inappropriate Big Brothers) for R-rated laughs while never losing its emotional core.
Rebecca
Bright
Bright creates world where humans, elves and orcs all live together in a caste type society where magic exists with clear tensions between all of these different living sentient beings. And David Ayer decided to make a riff on his own movie Training Day with Will Smith as a cop that says "fairy lives don't matter today" without an ounce of irony and Joel Egerton giving the most human performance in three hour's worth of makeup that works better as an action comedy than anything else it's trying to be. Bad world-building, worse storytelling, massively disappointing. The lowlight of writer/director David Ayer's cop movies.
Rebecca
Reno 911: The Movie
Is this movie just an excuse for Lt. Dangle and company to fuck around for 80 minutes instead of 20? Yes it is. Do I care. F*** no. The Cops send-up goes bigger for their feature film with swanky new location that peppers in a number of the series' signature bits and characters, while taking advantage of their new locale for beach and boat related shenanigans. No one grows. Everyone's an idiot and an asshole. And maybe, just maybe they'll accidentally succeed just enough to keep their jobs in Reno. Stupid fun.
Rebecca
Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed
If I told you that a movie had Freddie Prinze Jr., Sarah Michelle Gellar, Matthew Lillard, Linda Cardellini, Seth Green, Tim Blake Nelson and Alicia Silverstone in a movie written by James Gunn, I could probably get you to watch it right now. But somehow you make a live-action version of the beloved cartoon and everyone hates it? As much as critics didn't like this movie it has aged infinitely better than the pop culture spewing trash we've had to endure like the Alvin and the Chipmunks trilogy. Dumb family fun can be a lot worse.
Deanna
Self Reliance
Jake Johnson writes, directs and stars in this breezy comedy thriller, that feels perfectly in line with Johnson as a performer. The setup is that Johnson, a directionless man, is tapped by shadowy figures to survive assassination attempts for 30 days. With one giant loophole, he has to be alone. Thus kicks off one isolated man's attempts to connect with his fellow humans in a movie that feels like a mid-life crisis therapy session blended with The Running Man. It's super funny, the cast are all phenomenal, and it serves as a nice reminder to embrace life and connection. Highly recommend.
Rebecca
Flubber
Robin Williams human cartoon persona has rarely been used this effectively in a kids movie. And thanks to a mostly CGI co-star that happens to be a green goo, you might as well put this in the pantheon of "everything a kid who grew up in the 90s could possibly want," movie. I don't care that if the original comedy with Jerry Lewis is considered better. This is my silly movie uncle hamming it up with some kind of Nickelodeon concocted substance and sticking in to dickhead business men. No I haven't watched it since I was a child and I don't plan to!
Rebecca
Candyman (1992)
RIP to genre legend Tony Todd who was never more frightening and enticing than as the titular villain in this 1992 cult favorite. As messy as Bernard Rose's adaptation of Clive Barker's novel often is, frequently delving into themes about racism, white voyeurism and inequality, Virginia Madsen's descent into Candyman's grasp feels like an urban legend playing out in real time. And then there's Candyman himself whose look, origin and signature elements stand proudly in the pantheon of great horror villains.
Rebecca
A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night
The title of this film is inflammatory, both in its setting (Iran) and in the horror genre. But that's all part of what makes Ana Lil Amirpour's debut film feel so lived in and grounded compared to so many of its vampiric counterparts. Following a young boy who befriends the titular woman/vampire, the film captures the conflicting patterns of unease, desire and violence that exists beneath the surface of any society captured in crisp black and white cinematography. In a subgenre that loves its lore and mythology, this one swims in uncertainty and is all the better for it.
Rebecca
Saltburn
I'm of two minds about Saltburn. On the one hand, I really enjoy the film's desire to skewer the casual excess of British nobility and how the obsession with being near or gaining wealth and influence can mirror romantic obsession. Likewise the performances are strong across the board whether it's Barry Keoghan's disquieting Oliver Quick or Rosamund Pike's blasé matriarch. On the other hand, the movie is also incredibly clumsy with intentionally provocative sex scenes and "twists" that seem to reinforce the worst ideas about the "vulnerable rich," and the lower classes who want to be them. Black comedies are always a difficult needle to thread and I don't think Saltburn pulls it off.
Rebecca
Life After Beth
I'd have trouble getting over Aubrey Plaza too. This zombie comedy got lost in the surge of zombie movies in the 2010s but with a talented cast including the aforementioned Plaza, dane DeHaan, John C. Reilly, and Anna Kendrick , the movie is far more entertaining and impactful that you'd expect. Plaza plays Beth, DeHaan's girlfriend, who unexpectedly passes and comes back as a reanimated corpse...which really complicates the grieving process. Whether you read it as a metaphor for grieving, a breakup, or enjoy Plaza being a delightful weirdo, this personal approach to the works.
Rebecca
What We Do in the Shadows
If your indie mocumentary jump starts a film career and launches two successful TV shows you did something right. Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement write/direct and star in this movie about four vampires living their lives in Wellington, New Zealand as they prepare for a local ball for supernatural creatures. The real hook however is the vampires themselves who are equal parts delusional, awkward, stupid and horny, and just as likely to fight about whose turn it is to do the dishes as they are to walk on the ceiling with a glint in their eye. My wife and I regularly quote lines from this movie to this day. It's great fun.
Rebecca
The Boat that Rocked/Pirate Radio
This charming coming-of-age movie about a young man who hops aboard a pirato radio boat to meet and bond with his father, is a by the numbers affair. But when your cast includes Phillip Seymour Hoffman as your loud mouthed American DJ with Rhys Ifans, Bill Nighy, Nick Frost, Chris O'Dowd, Rhys Darby, Emma Thompson, and Kenneth Branagh popping in and out it's hard to complain. Combine that with a bunch of lesser known early rock classics and a classic snobs against slobs setup, and you've got movie that punches way above its weight class.
Rebecca
Charlie Bartlett
This movie about a young man who feigns mental illness to get drugs for his classmates has become something of a cult favorite. Part of that is due to a somewhat inconsistent tone that ranges from melodrama to teen comedy from scene to scene. Another part is that star Anton Yelchin demonstrates almost every aspect of his promising talent that was tragically cut short by an accident. But the reason this movie hits, at least for me, is the youthful desire to try and fix problems that adults are willfully ignoring by gaming the existing systems.
Rebecca
Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas
This movie had the unfortunate fate of being made at the wrong time. It was beautifully traditionally animated movie with CGI elements in an era when traditional animation was quickly being abandoned by major studios, it was yet another action adventure animated movie that likely felt too familiar to fans of The Road to El Dorado, Treasure Planet and Atlantis: The Lost Empire. It was also a swashbuckling movie that came out...a week before Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl came out and sucked up all the oxygen for sea-faring adventures. Which is a shame because this frequently forgotten film is the breezy kind of adventure movie that kids movies are currently missing. A fun one, if not a substantial one.
And for fun:
Rebecca (1940)
Hitchcock's adaptation of the titular novel is a classic for a reason. The simmering tension. The gothic atmosphere amplified by excellent black and white cinematography. And three phenomenal lead performance from Laurence Olivier (who is suitably hard to read), a determined Joan Fontaine as his new wife and a never more sinister Judith Anderson as Olivier's acerbic housekeeper. A mystery that feels like a ghost story, haunted by the memories and secrets of a woman who cannot reveal her intentions. An immaculate constructed movie.
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