Soderbergh Marathon: Part 2

Intro
Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989)

Behind the Candelabra (2013)

When I started this project, I assumed that I would watch his movies in order.  Due to his second and third movies being unavailable to me (among a couple others), I was stuck until I realized I did not need to watch his movies in order.  So I decided to watch his last movie after his first movie.  Of course by the time I have actually posted this thing, this is no longer his last movie.  But it was at the time of this writing to give you an idea how long ago I wrote this.

Behind the Candelabra is a biopic TV movie, but to define it as a TV movie is slightly inaccurate.  For all intents and purposes, it's a movie that came out in theaters.  I only mention that because a TV movie conspires images of shoddy production values, second-rate actors, and forgettable fare.  The slogan "It's not TV, it's HBO" is mostly accurate.  HBO Films has released a few interesting biopics in the past few years (Bessie, Get on Up) and Behind the Candelabra is one of them.

If I wasn't doing this project, I would never have watched this movie.  In order to watch a biopic, you either need to find the main subject compelling or you do it for the performances.  That's pretty much it.  I am not altogether that interested in Liberace's life.  I didn't see him play - he died before I was even born.  I don't listen to his music or watch his TV appearances or whatever else he did to become famous.

Soderbergh set out to not make the typical biopic film when he made Behind the Candelabra.  He was in talks with Douglas back when he was making Traffic in 2000, but couldn't find an appropriate angle.  In 2008, he decided to adapt the book by Scott Thorson as an angle for the movie and tapped Richard LaGravenese to write the screenplay.  LaGravenese was a seasoned veteran of writing movies, having written 13 movies by that point.  He doesn't seem to be a particularly good writer.  He doesn't seem bad either.  But his filmography is full of mediocre movies or worse.  So I'm intrigued by that choice.  Admirably, both Douglas and Damon signed on quickly and stuck with the movie as Soderbergh struggled to get it made over the next five years (because it was "too gay").  HBO Films picked it up and they made it for $23 million over a 30-day period.

To Soderbergh's credit, this isn't really a biopic film.  It is and it isn't.  It's about the relationship between Liberace and his much, much younger companion of about five years.  This film was clearly made with a love for Liberace.  There are a few scenes of just Liberace playing in front of a crowd.  It's what drew Scott into his feelings for Liberace in the first place.

The true stars of this movie are the people behind the makeup department.  Making a 44-year-old Matt Damon look not ridiculous as a 17-year-old is truly impressive work.  It's not explicitly stated that he's 17 which probably helps.  He definitely looks noticeably younger than normal and with certain mannerisms, Damon is convincing as at least being naive and young, which is basically all that is needed.  Scott also gets plastic surgery which had the effect of making him look much older and the age differential is much less distracting.  Douglas also had considerable makeup put on him throughout the film to make him credible as the Liberace.  More than most films, makeup was especially important for believability.

If you're not interested in Liberace - and he's a colorful, larger-than-life character so I imagine I might be in the minority in my disinterest - then the performances are enough to make it worth watching.  I did not know Douglas was capable of the performance he gives here.  It's not that I thought he was a bad actor.  He kind of reminded me of Tom Cruise in that he gives good performances but you never forget he's Michael Douglas.  But I have only seen a small portion of his films so that preconception was clearly inaccurate.  Much like Damon needed the mannerisms to make himself believable as a young guy, Douglas had the arguably much more difficult task of needing to have the mannerisms of a legend.  Put it this way: if you told me before this movie that Damon was playing a teenager for most of the movie and Douglas was playing Liberace, I would never have believed it would have worked.  But it does because of the makeup and the acting.

Basing this off only two films (and the other four I've seen), I really appreciate just how competent of a filmmaker Soderbergh is.  He has two essential traits that typically are underrated in a director: as a storyteller and the performances.  I guess I just appreciated the storytelling aspect more because sometimes a director can get lost when covering a large period of time, but the story here is coherent and makes sense.  He makes good decisions on what to keep, what to leave out, and how much time to spend on it.  Also, directors don't quite get enough credit for getting good performances out of their actors.  It's why good actors sometimes give bad performances in certain movies: bad direction.  Everyone in Sex, Lies, and Videotape gave a great performance and the same holds true here.

The movie begins with a director's touch.  The screen is blurry, and you can make out a bar scene.  It gradually focuses and becomes clear as you see Bob Black across the bar.  Scott's eyes - and our eyes - are opened to a whole new world of possibilities and he conveys that with that shot.  Soderbergh also has a few extended scenes of Liberace playing the piano and the audience reaction.  Soderbergh is clearly a fan.  These scenes effectively mesmerize the audience as they presumably mesmerized his live audiences back in 1977.  He goes to quick cuts while the music reaches a crescendo, planting in your mind an amazement each time his piano strikes a new chord.  There's no need to understand why Scott was drawn to Liberace in those moments.

Soderbergh also effectively hides the low budget that he was given.  At least, for a guy with as much opulence and wealth as Liberace, it might be kind of difficult to show that with a moderately low budget (Douglas and Damon had to have taken a fraction of what they usually cost for this movie).  Two examples are when he shows a jet flying in the air and the montage of Scott getting a bunch of expensive things.  The former was shot like it was in a cloud, which made it easier to blur the fact that he couldn't afford an aerial shot of a jet.  There's nothing noticeable about the latter (except a cool diagonal-from-the-ground shot of the front of an expensive white car with Las Vegas buildings in the background) except that it probably wasn't easy to portray a lavish lifestyle with the budget he had.  I will give particular due to the location scout who picked out the house where most of this movie is set.

Lastly, he shot the "Scott is high out of his mind" sequences on handheld, jarring the viewer into Scott's state of mind.  Shaky cam isn't my favorite filming technique, but when done with a purpose, it's extremely effective.  Speaking of drugs, Rob Lowe is in this and he is fucking HILARIOUS.  His character is the plastic surgeon who operates on both Scott and Liberace, and he plays all of his scenes like he is high out of his mind.  The makeup team once again does excellent work as his mere appearance creates laughs on its own.

Well that was more words than I planned to write.  I really wasn't expecting to go into this much detail with these posts.  I can't guarantee that will continue as I'm sort of beholden to where the words take me.  I'm not going to stretch these posts out if I have nothing more to say.  Behind the Candelabra is a good film with good performances.  If you're interested in seeing Douglas play Liberace - and that's honestly a good hook - you'll probably enjoy this film.

2.5/4 stars

Soderbergh Marathon: Part 1

Intro

Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989)

Sex, Lies, and Videotape started Steven Soderbergh's long career in filmmaking and thus that's where I start in looking back at his career .  Sex, Lies, and Videotape certainly lives up to its name.  It has sex, it has lies, and it has videotape.  It's an interesting film that's for sure.  I'm honestly not sure how I feel about it.  It was worth watching.  I know that.  I also was not bored while watching.

I do know that Soderbergh makes films that don't provide easy answers.  At least I think he does.  Though I suppose the ending of this movie is fairly easy.  Each plot point and each character arc gets addressed.  Ann Bishop Mullany is a housewife who quit her job for her husband.  She's unsatisfied with her life, though she convinces herself it is fine.  She doesn't want to touch her husband and has never had an orgasm.  Despite the fact that she's unhappy, she reasons that she has a good home, she's comfortable, and happiness is overrated.

Meanwhile, her husband is played by Peter Gallagher.  I don't want to say he's typecast, but he's played by Peter Gallagher.  If you've ever seen him in anything, you already know what type of person he is.  He's very good at playing this guy.  He plays this guy in fucking everything.  This might even be the genesis of that guy.  The reason he's so good at it is that he's somehow so transparently awful but at the same time you can see the charm behind him.  You don't really question why women fall for him.  That's a really important element in this type of character.

Anyway, his friend, Graham Dalton, comes to town and apparently the two of them have wildly diverged in personality since the last time they saw them.  Apparently he went from a smarmy douchebag to a soft-spoken creep.  What's weird is that he kind of acts and talks like a creep.  James Spader is good in this, but I found myself wondering: How the fuck did this guy get so many women to agree to this?  It's just for his own personal collection!  It's not even like a study or something.  The reasons the two women that we know do this are clear and I have no issues with that.  But did he get a jealous sister and a vengeful wife in every town?  I guess he had nine years to do this.

Speaking of, I'll also say that Cynthia Patrice Bishop (what's with the three names for both sisters?) gets shortchanged as a character.  She really likes sex and is jealous of her sister to an extreme degree.  She has an affair with her husband and makes a videotape with Graham to spite her.  Just because she's not allowed.  I'll give credit to Laura San Giacomo for making this character work.  I really can't imagine her working on the page nearly as well as she does on the screen, mostly due to San Giacomo.

In fact, this whole cast is great.  Andie McDowell got nominated for a Golden Globe for her part in this movie (and San Giacomo did too).  I'm being a bit too critical of this movie, but I think the writing is only ok in this movie, and the performances elevate it.  The dialogue is actually good, but I don't think the characters are that well-drawn and it relies on the performers to make up for it (which they do.)  For instance, Spader's character on the page?  No chance that works with a lesser actor.

I don't know what makes a film feel distinctly Soberbergh, but I did notice a few of his directing choices.  First off, the way he sets up the film is rather well-done.  We find out everything we need to know in a quick 10 minutes.  Ann Bishop is talking to her therapist while her husband is cheating on her and Graham is cleaning himself in a gas station bathroom.  Boom.  I also liked the first shot - which is a shot of the road moving from the perspective of the underside of car.  It was was one of the few times I think he indulged in making a cool shot for the sake of making a cool shot.  It works as an opening shot though as that's one of the times you can get really creative without it being obtrusive to the movie in my opinion.

Secondly, the videotape reveal was done well.  She finds out her husband is cheating on her, she goes directly to Graham's to make a videotape, she convinces Graham to actually make the tape, and then we cut to her asking for a divorce.  The husband goes to fight Graham and then we see the tape from his perspective in the grainy video and then it transitions from a third party perspective to the conclusion of the tape.  Lastly, he's just good at making a logical story.  It's a small thing, but I noticed he kept giving iced tea to his visitors and then at the end, he says he's out of iced tea right when I was wondering how much fucking iced tea he had.  Also, not that it was particularly hard to figure out, but a throwaway line about how the sister can't find her earrings is nonetheless appreciated for setting up the finale ahead of time.

I don't demand that every plot or character gets resolves, but I was curious at the decision to not really address that the sister relationship at the end.  Clearly, their relationship was not central to the film's mind.  Ann finds out that her sister cheated and we don't see them interact until the end, and given that she has a job and is comfortable with Graham, that's presumably some time later.  Graham's impotence is solved, the husband gets his comeuppance, and obviously Ann seems happy.  The sister?  She's the plot driver, but that's about it.  There's no conclusion to her arc, which I just find weird because I consider her one of the four main characters and the other three all get an ending.

All in all, I think this is an average movie elevated by the performances and by the direction.  I won't get a true picture of how I think he is as writer, because he didn't write that many movies and what he did write was either co-written by him or he's adapted it from something (which isn't an easy thing, but does seem like an ideal format for a really good director).  I guess I could watch the two movies he wrote that he didn't direct, but neither seem that good.  Anyway, as a director, this movie leaves me excited.  Because if he can elevate what I think would be an average movie in most director's hands, I wonder what he can do with a good movie.

3/4 stars

The Steven Soderbergh Marathon

Back in 2016, I had what I thought was a great idea.  I was going to delve into the filmography of Steven Soderbergh, and talk about each movie of his as I watched it.  When I was about to start it, I realized that I only access to maybe half of his movies.  I started the project anyway.  I made it through just three movies.  I never posted a single one of them either.  I was rightfully afraid that I would stop midway through and it would look like an incomplete project, so I wanted to watch all of the movies before I posted the first one.

That project got away from me and I hadn't thought about it since.  Until I thought of the idea to write my rankings for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and noticed a few completed, unpublished drafts of my plan.  So naturally, I'm using my current situation of needing to stay at home to actually complete what will end up being a nearly four and half year project.  Which is of course misleading as hell, but it sounds better when I put it that way.

I obviously wanted to get a head start on the movies I had watched and written about before I started this project.  I think finishing all 30 of his movies would be asking too much of myself.  But I do have nine of them done as of this writing and will probably have 10 done before I publish my first of 30 movies.  I am also started this to "put pressure on myself."  Once I've started this, I'll feel compelled to finish it.  That's the idea anyway.

So on Wednesday, hopefully, I'll post my thoughts on Steven Soderberg's first ever movie, Sex Lies and Videotape.  Unfortunately, I wrote my thoughts on that movie four years ago, so I hope the younger version of me has the same taste as this current version of me.  I imagine so, but I definitely didn't want to re-do movies I had already done, so you'll forgive me for not starting over on that one.

If you are reading this post after I have already posted some Soderbergh movies, then below you will find the now published thoughts on those movies to make this easier.  And if you're not sure of the progress I've made and want to check, this will be a handy post to return to in the future.  So hopefully, there's an interest in Steven Soderbergh movies, one of the most interesting and varied modern filmmakers in the business.

Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989)
Kafka (1991)
King of the Hill (1993)
The Underneath (1995)
Schizopolis (1996)
Gray's Anatomy (1996)
Out of Sight (1998)
The Limey (1999)
Erin Brokovich (2000)
Traffic (2000)
Ocean's Eleven (2001)
Solaris (2002)
Ocean's Twelve (2004)
Bubble (2005)
The Good German (2006)
The Informant! (2007)
Ocean's Thirteen (2007)
Che (2008)
The Girlfriend Experience (2009)

And Everything Was Going Fine (2010)
Contagion (2011)

Magic Mike (2012)
Side Effects (2013)
Behind the Candelabra (2013)
Logan Lucky (2017)
Unsane (2018)
The Laundromat (2019)
High Flying Bird (2019)

Movie Review: The Way Back

There will be two types of people who will see The Way Back and decide to give it a shot.  The first is someone who likes watching underdog sports movies, the type where you know the basic structure before you watch it, but still enjoy anyway.  The second are people who are more interested in seeing Ben Affleck's performance than the sports movie aspect.  Neither type will be disappointed watching this I imagine.

Affleck plays Jack, a former high school basketball star who is down on his luck.  He's an alcoholic - to say the least.  He's the type of alcoholic who drinks all morning, all day, and all night, and when he wakes up the next morning, he might just finish the warm beer on his dresser.  He spends his time working construction and not doing much of anything else besides drinking.  He is jolted out of his rut when his former high school offers him a job as the head basketball coach after the previous one had a health scare that caused him to quit.  He obviously accepts or there is no movie.

The movie takes great pains to look realistic.  The high school basketball aspect is impressively realistic.  When he witnesses them practice, they don't look horrible.  Without drawing attention to it, there are basketball reasons the team is bad, basketball reasons that a good coach could fix.  So when they start winning, it's more believable than most of these type of movies.  I can't praise this aspect of the movie enough.

Of course, this movie does follow some of the classic sports movie clichés.  Hell, the premise itself is basically a cliché.  For some people - the sports movie fans I mentioned above - this is not necessarily a weakness.  In fact, when these movies are well done, they'd probably be very happy with result and I don't think this movie is an exception to the rule.

For people interested in Affleck's performance, they will also get what they came for.  He's very good in this movie.  Most reviews will mention his personal life and honestly I don't know anything about that, but Affleck has turned into a underrated actor in my opinion.  He's just an actor that needs the right director to give a good performance.

That director is Gavin O'Connor.  O'Connor is very familiar with the sports movie.  He was the director of both Miracle and Warrior.  He has the credentials in other words.  He also directed the pilot of The Americans, a fact none of you will care about, but gives him more bonus points than any movie he might have directed.

The movie also has good performances outside of Affleck.  Comedian Al Madrigal is the assistant coach, and while that may make you think he'd provide comic relief, he's there strictly for a dramatic role.  The little bit of humor in this movie is mostly provided by the excessive cussing by Affleck in front of a devoutly Catholic, disapproving Father.  Janina Gavankar (who I know from The League) and Michaela Watkins both play small parts as the ex-wife and sister, respectively.

I will warn some people here.  The basketball aspect of this movie is more like a setting.  It still kind of works as a sports movie, but understand that the movie is more focused on the main character.  Part of me thinks the movie would have been even more effective had the reasons for his alcoholism not been so clear cut.  I'm not going to spoil it because the movie plays it like a surprise and doesn't reveal it for a while.  Let's just say you don't blame him, which to me loses a bit of the power of the story.  But that's a personal gripe, and most critics don't seem bothered by that.

I realize this review reads like a better movie than the grade I'm ultimately going to give it, which could be a sign that you, general reader, will think higher of this movie than me.  And the reason is that, despite all I said, I just can't get over that I thought this was just an average movie.  I actually think the one, unfortunately vague complaint I have ended up bothering me more than it will the average viewer.  It ends up making the movie feel more manufactured, which is unfortunate because everything else about it feels pretty realistic.

If you're one of the two types of people I described above, absolutely watch this movie.  You'll get what you came for.  If you're not, I wouldn't go out of my way to watch this movie, but you also won't regret it if you ignore my advice.

2.5/4 stars

Marvel Rankings

Throughout the last month, I have steadily been working my way through the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  It started before the coronavirus hit, so I'd probably not be writing this post if not for that and certainly wouldn't have written it this fast.  I very quickly wanted to rank them as I was watching them, which made it easier for the final ranking, and I started by posting them on Twitter.  It became clear around halfway through this that it was not entirely feasible to stick to rankings on Twitter.  I also thought I'd need to explain myself.  Which I believe I do given some of the rankings are perhaps not quite in line with the popular consensus.  Although I honestly don't know the popular consensus, so maybe it's exactly the same.

I decided to organize the movies by giving them up to 4 stars.  This helped immensely when figuring out the rankings, as it simplified my process.  I would usually figure out a 1-4 star rating, look at the comparable movies, and decide where to put it.  Sometimes, the comparable movies were obviously better or worse, so I adjusted on the fly.  More importantly, I point out the stars to indicate that they're roughly comparable and the specific order is perhaps not as important.  I think most of the 2.5 star movies are interchangeable in quality, but I am firm in believing a 3 star movie is better than a 2.5 star movie.  So don't get too worked up if you think a movie in 18th place belongs in 12th place.  However, I really do believe the 11th place is better than the 12th place.  Make sense?

Let's get started.

4 stars

1. Iron Man (2008)

I saw Iron Man so long ago, I don't specifically remember how good I thought it was at the time.  I know I liked it.  But rewatching Iron Man, I was shocked by how great a movie it is.  It's fantastic.  It's basically a perfect movie.  I can't really imagine an origin story being better than Iron Man, honest to god.  Oh and the ending?  Big smile on my face.  I actually think Jeff Bridges provides one of the better villains of the MCU too (which... might say more about the rest of the villains but still).  While his motivations are perhaps undercooked, they don't really need to be anything more?  Unlike some other surprise villain reveals, his position in the company makes him not a good guy in the first place.  And I think Jeff and RDJ do a good job of conveying their bond pre-evil turn to sell the betrayal and create personal stakes.

This movie is ultimately responsible for the Marvel formula, the witty banter while fighting and undercut everything with a joke, but it never feels forced here, where it does a lot in later movies.  Which goes a long way towards explaining how that came to be the formula in the first place.  But sorry folks, no other movie ended up topping the very first movie in the MCU.

2. Captain America: Civil War (2016)

This is not a perfect movie even though I'm giving it the perfect grade.  But I will say I can't really imagine a superhero movie with this scope and challenge being better than this movie is.  There's just so much on this movie's plate and the fact that very little of it can be questioned is a miracle.  And what can be questioned could be called nitpicks.  I'd get into detail on those nitpicks, but the gist of it is "Some of the superhero characters' decision to take a certain side are perhaps not that well developed" but I'm not sure there was a way around that and I was ultimately able to talk myself into why characters chose which side.  I just wish the movie didn't make me do that.

But the central two characters - Tony Stark and Steve Rogers - are very well developed, and this is where a benefit of a Marvel universe really comes into play.  On top of that, this movie has what is easily the best and smoothest new superhero introduction in the Marvel Universe in Black Panther.  T'Challa has an arc that could have been its own movie.  He was included so that they could have a third party with their own motivations and it could not have been more successful.  They also get points for introducing Spiderman, although his introduction is very much extraneous and not all that vital to the movie, even though he's a lot of fun and adds a good amount of humor.

3.5 stars

3. Black Panther (2018)

When you get right down to motivation, performance, and connection to the hero, Killmonger is the best villain in the MCU.  He's not the most dangerous (Thanos obviously), but he is the best.  I don't really agree with them, but there's a reason that there's a sizable contingent of fans who say "Killmonger was right."  He certainly brings up good points, as all good villains should.  That's the main reason Black Panther is as high as it is.  It isn't higher because W'Kabi (played by Get Out's Daniel Kaluuya) wasn't better developed.  Or developed at all.  His turn to support Killmonger is weak, considering he's great friends with T'Challa and his wife is on opposite sides as him.  And then he changes his mind later.  Neither of these actions are all that meaningful to us, because he gets no characterization at all.  The final battle is a little weak as well, although I personally think it's made up for by the dying scene.

4. Thor: Ragnorak (2017)

This movie is 130 minutes of fun.  It's fair to say it's the funniest movie in the MCU by a good margin.  The best parts of the previous two Thor movies was clearly the comedy, and director Taika Waititi mines as much comedy out of this movie as possible.  It's essentially a straight up comedy.  They hired Cate Blanchett for the villain part and she acts the hell out of the part, but she can't really escape the weak villain thing that plagues most MCU movies.  It's not quite getting the best score, because I didn't really like anything about the Odin parts of this movie, although I'm glad they let Anthony Hopkins ham it up when Loki was pretending to be him at least so his part wasn't completely useless.

5. Avengers (2012)

Here's a possibly underrated movie.  I'm not exactly sure of its reputation at this point, but I just know that it's impossible for this movie to not feel slight in comparison to the Avenger team-ups that follow this.  And it has its fair share of things I could complain about.  I almost feel guilty complaining about Thor and Iron Man fighting, because it was studio mandated, but well it sure as hell feels studio mandated.  This movie still has quite a few awesome sequences: the opening scene, Black Widow's introduction (to this movie, not the MCU), and Hulk smashing Loki is just great.  Also the groundwork for future infighting is started here, without it feeling like something purely there to set up another movie (something future movies are guilty of doing)

6. Captain America: Winter Soldier (2014)

This is a movie that doesn't quite hold up as well as the first viewing experience.  It's inspired by the 70s conspiracy theories, but for being that movie, it doesn't have any "we don't know who is on our side or not."  I mean theoretically the movie has that, but not really.  Once Captain America enters the elevator after meeting Robert Redford, the good guys always know who the bad guys are.  But I can't hate too much on a movie that really upped the action sequence of the MCU, including introducing inventive ways for Captain America to use his shield.  Plus, there's that elevator scene and Nick Fury needing to escape his car.  Also, I really wish the Bucky-Steve friendship was better developed at this point - admittedly more of a failure for the first movie - and they were going for the surprise reveal, but I think an opening scene of Bucky and Steve in the 40s would have reminded us better.  I like to think these movies work as standalone but if that was the case, we'd have zero reason to care about Bucky and Steve as friends.

3 stars

7. Avengers: Endgame (2019)

This movie is fairly recent, so I'll just give a warning here: SPOILERS.  STOP READING IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THIS.  I think the time travel aspect mostly worked, but I'll also say: it made it fucking impossible for me to figure out where to rank this.  I get a headache trying to make sense of the time travel stuff, especially the Captain America part, which is touching, but also... would definitely change things!  There's tons of small shit like that where you have to turn off your brain and I do not like having to turn off my brain when watching movies!  But the time travel arcs also lead to lots of really cool moments that wouldn't be possible otherwise, so...?  Also Black Widow and Hawkeye's fates should have switched places.  Hawkeye became a fucking mass murderer and now he's just gonna go back to his family like nothing happened?  Nah, that dude should have died instead.  And holy hell the disparity between how Iron Man's death was treated compared to Black Widow is a fucking travesty.  She was an Avenger, or a part of Shield, longer than Tony was!  She's just as integral to the them.  Anyway, there's also a lot "FUCK YEAH" parts of the movie, which make this, as I said, impossible to rank.  Movies with these type of problems usually accompany less FUCK YEAH moments, and movies with this many FUCK YEAH moments usually accompany a movie with less problems.  So this is my solution?  I don't know.

8. Spiderman: Homecoming (2017)

I liked the Tobey Maguire movies and I don't necessarily think he's a flaw in those movies, but he just happened to be in good movies, instead of being the reason the movies were good.  He never at any point feels like a teenager.  Tom Holland, on the other hand, does.  I appreciated the villain in concept more than execution, although the execution when Peter Parker shares the car ride with him is certainly great.  While any Spiderman story is going to have his personal life infect his real life, I think the movie stacked the deck a ridiculous amount to where anyone could put together that he's Spiderman.  Which is of course how the villain figured it out (and the best character development he gets, oddly enough, is at the end when he refuses to reveal he knows it's Peter Parker).  Anyway, this is clearly a blast of a movie and that's really what matters.

9. Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

This is one of those movies where it feels like my complaints are inextricably tied to the ambitions of the movie: there's just no way of avoiding them.  For one, too many characters get absolutely nothing to do.  Which yes, is a function of the ambition, but one thing that is avoidable is the movie's treatment of Captain America, who's basically the heart and soul of these movies and gets NOTHING (He gets a lot of screentime in Endgame, but I don't think it makes up for this).  Bruce Banner battles with the Hulk, Iron Man gets a whole fatherhood thing with Peter Parker, Thor gets some PTSD-like small moments, Wanda and Vision are connected to raise the personal stakes, but Captain America?  Nothing.  Black Widow too, whose arc in Endgame makes her lack of doing anything here more annoying to me.  Anyway, the Wanda and Vision thing didn't work for me either.  I am not invested in them as a couple.  Vision has been completely useless since he was created despite seemingly having the powers that could beat any of the human Avengers.

The other problem is a plot one and that's Peter Quill being the stupidest character alive.  There had to be a way for them to film some version of what happens without Peter Quill fucking everything up.  I am legitimately knocking off half a star for that shit.  But I watched this in theaters and the power of the last 15 minutes sure goes a long way.  It's also a nonstop action ride, which is thrilling the first time, less so in subsequent viewings, which is why it's at a solid 3 star and not higher.

10. Spiderman: Far From Home (2019)

There's a part of me that thinks I'm overrating the Spiderman movies and if you think that, I'm not sure I can disagree.  One of the main beefs against Spiderman, MCU-version, is that giving him Tony Stark tech removes some of who is as a character, and I'm sympathetic to that viewpoint, but at the same time, I think Holland sells the necessary parts of him to still feel like he's still Spiderman.  The weak point of this movie, and it's kind of the point, is the action, which almost feels tacked-on in some of these MCU movies. Which is kind of weird because it's ostensibly an action movie, but I'm not really watching these movies for the action.

11. Ant-Man (2015)

This movie was most definitely unfairly judged by a certain circle of moviegoers and critics.  They wanted an Edgar Wright movie, and this was not an Edgar Wright movie.  Admittedly, I'm not the biggest Wright fan, so this was not remotely an issue for me.  Also Paul Rudd goes a long way.  And Michael Peña regularly stole scenes in this movie.  This is another example of a movie with just a nothing villain, and I really have no idea why Marvel has such a villain problem.  But this is a light and breezy movie that knows exactly what it is and I give it points for that.

2.5 stars

12. Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

I did not realize how forced the family aspect of this movie was until rewatch.  It really isn't earned at all.  They're entertaining swashbucklers who have competing goals and are forced into a prison together.  They all team up and break out because they all want to break out and then that is apparently enough for them to feel like a family even though that's not really consistent with the characters as they were introduced whatsoever.  Also there's unmemorable villains and then there's this guy who somehow achieves another level of unmemorable you didn't think possible.  Anyway, the first hour or so of this movie is just about perfect, I just think it would have worked slightly better if James Gunn had found a way to continue having the characters uneasily work together for the rest of the movie instead of forcing the family part, which again pretty much comes out of nowhere.

13. Thor (2011)

It's really too bad the first 20 or so minutes after the humans find Thor are kind of a drag on this story, because it's otherwise a very good origin story.  I guess it was necessary to give backstory to the conflict that would ensue and give a history lesson, but it just kind of goes on and on and isn't that interesting.  Once Thor jumps back onto Earth for a good fish-out-of-water comedy, the movie works very well.  I also enjoyed the Shakespearian themes, which I guess is why Kenneth Branaugh directed it.  Like I said, it's just those 20 minutes of exposition that make this more boring than it should be.

14. Captain America: First Avenger (2011)

I think Chris Evans excellent performance carried this movie, because there's really not much else there.  Stanley Tucci is also excellent and more fleshed out than anyone else.  But as far as Peggy Carter and Bucky Barnes, the movie simply gives us two likable actors and doesn't really do any work to develop them at all.  "You like this actor, so you like this character" is pretty much the only development either get.  This movie also has that awful scene where pre-fame Natalie Dormer makes out with Rogers just to make Peggy jealous.  But they weren't a thing?!  Were they supposed to be a thing at this point?  The movie should have made that clear!  Anyway, it was the worst form of forced conflict.  Here's another bland villain.  But this movie nailed the important part of the movie: Captain America.

15. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)

The family thing works better here.  In some ways I think this is a better movie than the first one.  And Kurt Russell is certainly more memorable than the first villain.  But I think they bit off more than they can chew with his apparent motivation, which is so utterly alien of a concept, I cannot imagine any human remotely wanting to be in his place.  He's a god so he has different goals, but he's supposed to convince Peter Quill to join him, and Quill is human enough that I can't imagine it ever being a desirable position.  Like living alone in the universe for eternity - welcome to my hell!  For real, it sounds more like hell to me than any convincing argument.  So that's where the movie loses me.

16. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Here's the counterpoint to Civil War.  Much like Civil War, Age of Ultron has a lot on its plate.  There's a lot of emphasis on future Marvel developments, more than we knew at the time.  This movie wasn't exactly poorly reviewed at the time, but I've never seen a movie's reputation go down quicker than this one.  A lot of it works though.  But it's the downside to what happens when you put too much on your plate.  It didn't really help that Quicksilver was in both this and X-Men and this was clearly the less memorable and inferior version.

17. Iron Man 3 (2013)

Boy do I not get the love for this movie!  It's fine.  I want to blame it for the fact that some people really, really love Shane Black, but I happen to like The Nice Guys, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and Lethal Weapon a lot!  So I feel like I'm the target audience to overrate it.  Part of the problem with this movie, and I think Black absolutely knows this, is that it's kind of nonsense.  It's as silly as the second Iron Man, but the movie seems to know that.  It's fun, don't get me wrong.  But this has a contingent of fans who like this movie a lot more than I understand.  I watched it for the first time a couple weeks ago, and I imagine this is one of the more rewatchable movies from Marvel of the 2.5 star variety.  So I'll give it that.

18. Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)

The sequel of Ant-Man actually got better reviews than the first one, which is a little confusing to me.  I'm guessing a large part of the charm is that the stakes are refreshingly low.  Lower than the first movie really.  It's a madcap type movie.  It's ever so slightly worse than the first one to me, because the first one asks you to accept less flaws than this one does.  The movie has so much made up technobabble that the movie even makes fun of itself for it.  Like everything about the quantum, just no.  Michelle Pfeiffer is fine after 30 years there, but also it's incredibly dangerous if you're there for a short amount of time?  There's no rules.  Just make shit up so the screenwriters can have conflict.  Also him having to be home before the cops just makes it seem like Scott has a transportation device, because it doesn't seem possible that he beats the cops every time, especially when they have like a five minute head start on him at the end!

2 stars

19. Doctor Strange (2016)

Doctor Strange reminds me of Avatar, the 2009 blockbuster hit.  I should have seen it in theaters, and since I didn't, I'm probably not going to think as highly of this film as people who did.  Also like Avatar, it's beautiful, but there's not much here.  I don't know if it's in the comics, but I think it's completely silly how Doctor Strange got himself injured.  We get it.  He's an insufferable dick with no regard for everyone else.  I would have liked this movie more, but Doctor Strange is the only actor who's developed at all.  Rachel McAdams is wasted.  Mads Mikkelsen tries his best, but he's wasted too.  Chiwetel Ejiofor is clearly set up for a sequel which is pretty annoying.  Focus on the movie you're making now!

20. Captain Marvel (2019)

I wanted to like this movie more and I thought I would.  There's just something that isn't quite clicking in this movie.  It's set in the 1990s and it sure feels like it.  And I mean that it feels like a superhero movie made in the 1990s and that is not a compliment.  The 90s references are beat you over the head obvious.  The fight scenes at the end, in all their CGI-ness, just don't look good.  I did enjoy the buddy comedy of Fury and Carol Danvers, which compromised most of this movie.

21. Thor: The Dark World (2013)

This is obviously the first movie inverted, with Jane being the fish-out-of-water element.  Which is a good idea in theory, but it's not as funny.  Tom Hiddleston is basically the only reason to watch this movie, stealing pretty much every scene he's in and providing most of the humor and fun.  Again, the villain is played by a great actor who ends up being yet another bland Marvel villain.  I seriously don't know why they have so much trouble with the villains.

1.5 stars

22. Iron Man 2 (2010)

I'm giving this 1.5 stars, so you'll have to believe me when I say this is better than I remember.  I obviously didn't think that highly of it going into my rewatch.  Black Widow's introduction makes this basically watchable, if not good.  Sam Rockwell and Mickey Rourke should work better than they do, but they don't work at all.  And Tony Stark spends this whole movie behaving like an idiot.  Not a huge departure from his normal self, but it's just not that fun to watch.  It's just not very well-written as a movie.  Sorry Justin Theroux.

23. The Incredible Hulk (2008)

This movie is just so ridiculously boring.  The director's filmography is a warning to not watch this movie: Transporter 2, Now You See Me.  I mean this is easily the worst directed of the Marvel movies.  In concept, what's on screen could work, and the actors certainly have the talent to make it work.  But the Hulk being on the run from the government is the entire movie.  There's very little plot.  This bewilderingly got good reviews at the time, and I think it got a bit lucky coming when it did.  I don't remember the Ang Lee Hulk, but this was a straight action movie, which was evidently what people wanted.  I'm sure I'd like the Lee version better than this movie.

And there you have it.  All 23 movies ranked.  I'm sure there will be disagreements, and I hope I explained my positions well, even if you disagree.

My Thoughts on Interstellar

I don't often feel compelled to write about movies I watch.  But when I do, it's probably because it wasn't a good movie.  For better or worse, it is way easier for me to write about a movie that is not very good and I know exactly why I think it's not very good than to write about an average movie or a good movie.  Even if I know why those movies are good, it's usually not that interesting and it's hard to be more specific than "this part of the movie was good."

Interstellar was not a good movie.  I am truly bewildered by the IMDB score of 8.6 (though IMDB has a weird... thing about Christopher Nolan.  All of his movies are overrated by that site), the critical rating of 74/100 by Metascore, the Rotten Tomatoes of 71% and the 85% of the audience on Rotten Tomatoes who liked the film.  I feel like I watched a different movie than all of these people.  It's not that I don't think I can have a different opinion from the consensus, I'm just not completely sure how people came away from this movie liking it.

This movie is boring.  It's ridiculously slow for most of the movie's running time.  The score is overwhelming in a bad way.  It's really long.  I'm sure all the space stuff is inaccurate, though I honestly don't care.  There's a TON of clunky exposition and nonsense technical jargon.  I'm trying to figure out just how exactly bad this movie would be if Matthew McConaughey wasn't in it.  If this movie fails to be good, he sure as hell doesn't.  (All the actors are pretty good)

All of the above can be somewhat forgiven.  It's not the first good movie that is slow or seemingly too long.  It's definitely not the only movie that seems pretty inaccurate.  Clunky exposition and technical jargon is a tradeoff to getting to the point of the movie faster (which, this movie STILL takes forever despite the sheer amount of exposition and/or meaningless "science" stuff that is said).  But what can't be forgiven is one of the worst endings I have ever seen.  It ruined everything that came before.

Call me twisted, but I would have been very ok if the movie just ended with Cooper dying in space, sacrificing himself so that Brand could very unlikely see her husband.  I would have called this an average movie with great visuals, amazing acting, and good direction.  But... whatever the fuck happened after that is just... awful.  I still don't really understand what happened.  Don't explain it to me either.  It's all bullshit.  He communicated with his daughter in space through I assume a black hole because....... yeah I don't know.  There's not really a logic to it.  Then he gets rescued of all fucking things.  If you're gonna have a bullshit ending where he somehow helps save the world, at least let him be a martyr.

I feel like there are certain movies that get better reviews than the quality of the movie because if you have a checklist of what makes a movie great, it fills enough boxes to at warrant two stars.  You feel guilty giving a well-directed, well-acted film anything below 2 stars because it is well-directed and well-acted.  Most of the time, this correlates to a good movie.  Sometimes, it leads to a movie getting infinitely better reviews than it deserves, because like I said, if a movie is well-directed and well-acted, you expect it to be good.

Interstellar is the exception and my theory above is the only reason I can fathom that it got good reviews.  It didn't get great reviews, but it did get good enough reviews where I would watch a movie based on those reviews.  I don't know.  I just can't put into words my confusion.  There are movies where after watching it, I understand why my opinion diverges from the public or the critics.  This is not one of those movies.  I "know" a movie that critics will tend to overrate and I "know" a movie that the public will overrate.  This doesn't seem like either movie though.  It seems too boring and long for the public to love it, and its ending seems like an awful enough one that I don't know how any critic gave this a great review.  I will never not be confused about this movie, because I do not ever plan on watching this movie again.

1.5/4 stars

Oscar Predictions

Since I already made Oscar predictions for fantasy baseball draft order (yes, you read that right), I figured I'd make it public to see how dumb or smart I really am with the awards business.  Plus, I've seen most of these movies.

Best Picture
I believe the Best Picture is picked by a ranking system.  Theoretically, a picture get could only get 2nd place votes and still win.  Thus, my pick will operate on that assumption.  It appears, unlike most years, where there's one likely choice (La La Land last year) and one longshot (Moonlight), this year has five movies with a somewhat legitimate chance.  That's partially because of the ranking system.

My least favorite of the 9 choices and one of the "favorites" is Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri.  I don't think this will win because it's very divisive.  I also don't like it.  So this is an easy one for me not to pick.  The other "favorite" is probably The Shape of Water, because it's also the favorite to have the best director.  The two less likely choices are Get Out, Lady Bird, and Call Me By Your Name.

It really doesn't seem like there's a clear frontrunner here from what I've read so I'll just go with my choice, Get Out.  It's the most popular of the other three choices (since I don't think Shape of Water will win) and I think it's the best.

My guess: Get Out
My pick: Get Out

Actor in Leading Role
Well this category is boring, because 1) I haven't seen three of these movies and 2) it seems like there's going to be an obvious winner.  Despite the fact that I haven't seen Darkest Hour, I'm going with Gary Oldman because he's won most of the awards before the Oscars.  I could go with the darkhorse Timothee Chalamet, but come on.  Never won before Gary Oldman in prosthetics playing a famous historical figure is the easiest choice ever as far as predictions go.

My guess: Darkest Hour
My pick: Timothee Chalamet

Actress in Leading Role
This is one of those categories where making a predictions post is already more pointless than normal.  It's going to be Frances McDormand.  I'm fine with this.  She definitely wasn't what I disliked about Three Billboards.  I would probably choose Sally Hawkins here because one of the main components of acting - speaking - is taken away from her the whole movie.  She's also in a better movie, which I won't pretend has no impact on my choices.

My guess: Frances McDormand
My pick: Sally Hawkins

Actor in a Supporting Role
Another award where I'm forced to pick Three Billboards, although in this guess I'm a little more perplexed why he's a favorite.  I get McDormand.  If I liked the movie more (or at all), I'm sure I'd agree.  But Sam Rockwell is... fine?  His character is poorly written, which hurts his ability to act.  I mean that's not his fault, but that's no reason to give him the award.  I loved Richard Jenkins in The Shape of Water, but I'll have to go with William Dafoe as my personal preference since he's very much not William Dafoe.  He plays an ordinary guy and has to act with a cast of non-actors for the most part.

My guess: Sam Rockwell
My pick: William Dafoe

Actress in a Supporting Role
With most of these picks, I'm fine with not having seen every movie as it doesn't seem to harm my ability to correctly guess the winner.  This is not one of those categories.  I have not seen I, Tonya.  Allison Janney is very much the favorite.  I'm sure she's very good in this, but Laurie Metcalf is a performance that's hard for me to see topped.  So my preference is not exactly based on all the information.

My guess: Allison Janney
My pick: Laurie Metcalf

Writing (Original Screenplay)
With the caveat that I've only seen two of the five movies nominated, this one is easy.  Call Me By Your Name, which I have seen, is going to be the winner and probably should.  I've also seen Logan, which I loved, but the writing didn't necessarily stick out to me in the way Call Me By Your Name's did.

My guess: James Ivory (Call Me By Your Name)
My pick: James Ivory (Call Me By Your Name)

Writing (Original Screenplay)
This category is pretty stacked.  The Big Sick is great and I wouldn't mind if it won here because it doesn't appear to be nominated elsewhere.  Lady Bird and Get Out are both nominated in Best Picture and seemingly have a small chance.  But if I'm going to pick Get Out for the Best Picture, I got to stick with it here.

My guess: Jordan Peele (Get Out)
My pick: Jordan Peele (Get Out)

Directing
At first glance, this category is harder than it appears.  It stands to reason that the Best Picture being up for grabs means that the Best Director would be up for grabs too.  All five nominees are also Best Picture nominees, including three with legitimate chances.  But Guillermo del Toro seems to have pretty much emerged as the favorite here.  I think I would have to go with Dunkirk, because that movie was hard to watch in a way more war movies should be.

My guess: Guillermo del Toro (Shape of Water)
My pick: Christopher Nolan (Dunkirk)

Cinematography
I actually am not sure what the consensus is on this pick, but this is an easy decision because the movie is so damn beautiful and the man in question has been nominated FOURTEEN times without winning.  Just give Roger Deakins an Oscar already.

My guess: Roger Deakins (Blade Runner 2049)
My pick: Roger Deakins (Blade Runner (2049)

Animated Feature Film
Full disclosure: I haven't seen a single one of these films.  Doesn't mean this isn't an easy choice though.

My guess: Coco
My pick: Coco (I'm guessing)

The Sound Awards (Mix, Editing)
I'm giving both of these awards to Dunkirk, because sound plays a very important role in making me as miserable as possible watching it.  At this point, my guess and pick are the same so I will stop doing that.

Best Sound Mix: Dunkirk
Best Sound Editing: Dunkirk

Animated Short
Again, haven't actually seen any of these, so I'm going to be lame and vote for the one Kobe Bryant is involved with because that is something the Academy would do.

Dear Basketball

Costume Design
Just going to throw it out there that a movie that is literally about costume design is going to win this one.  It's also a period piece so that never hurts.

The Phantom Thread

Documentary
I'm not even going to pretend that I am doing anything other than picking these two because of what websites told me about them.  I don't even remember Icarus, but at least I know Heaven is a Traffic Jam is set in LA and that's why I picked it.

Feature: Icarus
Short Subject: Heaven is a Traffic Jam on the 405

Film Editing
A flawed, but enjoyable movie, I think this should probably go to Baby Driver, but I think it's going to Dunkirk

Dunkirk

Foreign Language
Sorry, I haven't seen any of these movies either.

A Fantastic Woman

Makeup and Hairstyling
Yeah this one is going to go to the movie that made Gary Oldman look like Winston Churchill.

The Darkest Hour

Music (Original Score)
I have seen literally all of these movies and I can't say I remember the original score that much of any of them.  Well that's not completely true.  I definitely remember The Last Jedi and Dunkirk, but both of those are extremely up both John Williams and Hans Zimmer's alleys that I don't feel like they deserve an award for it.  So my pick is...

Alexandre Desplat (The Shape of Water)

Music (Original Song)
This seems very much like a category a movie like Coco would win so

"Remember Me" - from Coco

Production Design
Shape of Water

Visual Effects
Both because I think it deserves it and because it seems like the least blockbuster of all five nominees (because it bombed), I'm going with Blade Runner 2049 on this one.