Movies

The Year is 1975

While looking around Amazon Prime for something to watch I found this little blast from the past, A Boy and His Dog, in the “Prime, Recently Added Movies” section. This movie came out in late 1975 and it was set post World War IV in the distant future year of 2024.

Donna and I were dating at the time and our go to date night was a movie at the on base theater at NAS Patuxent River, so I’m guessing we saw this together. It was 25¢ each to get in and we took turns, one would pay the admission and the other would buy the popcorn and drink. I certainly remember seeing this and being a sci-fi buff, I probably enjoyed it. The female nudity probably helped in that regard as well. I’m guessing Donna enjoyed it not so much, she has probably totally forgotten it.

The original trailer is totally unhinged:

And the trailer perfectly represents what you’d see if you watched the entire movie which if you are so inclined, is available to watch for free on YouTube. And when I say inclined, I mean under the influence of the brain chemistry altering substance of your choice.

Personally, having watched that trailer and some of the other clips on YouTube, I don’t think I could watch it again even if I did partake in a gummy of the finest Indica cannabis available to me.

Hope, Strikes, Return

Star Wars Edition of SORT
As of Saturday, May 18, 2024 at 9:00 PM pacific time:

Rise Dawn War
Episode IV
A New Hope		 Episode V
The Empire Strikes Back		 Episode VI
The Return Of The Jedi
Donna and I saw a movie called Star Wars while we were in the Navy stationed on Guam. I’m sure it wasn’t on the opening weekend. It had to be at least a week after that because we got everything a week late. All the TV shows were shifted exactly 7 days because the video tapes came by boat to the island. I’m pretty sure we saw the movie twice in quick succession. The first time because of the buzz about the movie and the second time we partook in the devil’s weed so we could see it while buzzed. In 1980 Donna was out of the Navy, but I was still in and stationed in Meridian, MS so we probably saw The Empire Strikes Back opening weekend in the mall’s multiplex. When The Return of the Jedi opened I was sitting on the U.S.S. Iwo Jima anchored not far from the coast of Beirut, so we probably didn’t see it until I returned to port Norfolk, VA in July.

Rise, Dawn, War

Planet of the Apes Edition of SORT
As of Sunday, May 12, 2024 at 9:00 PM pacific time:

Rise Dawn War
Rise of the
Planet of the Apes		 Dawn of the
Planet of the Apes		 War for the
Planet of the Apes
I read Pierre Boulle’s novel long before they made the first movie. I really liked the first movie, but was disappointed in the ending. I liked the book’s better, which they sort of tried to pay homage to in the 2001 version with Mark Walberg, but it still wasn’t right. I’ve seen these 3 movies before, but I’m rewatching them again because of the new Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes movie out this weekend. But I’ll be waiting to see that when it shows up on a streaming service.

Fire in the Hole

In the early seasons of Justified this was Boyd Crowder’s favorite saying. It comes from an Elmore Leonard short story that served as the genesis for FX’s series Justified. I have watched all 6 seasons of the show a few times now and I also recently watched the new Justified: City Primeval. But this post really isn’t about that, it is more about the last couple of days where I have been sucked into an Elmore Leonard movie hole.

While stumbling around looking for something to watch on Peacock I saw the movie Out of Sight from 1998 and thought, “Ooh, I remember that. Might be fun.” How is i that Jennifer Lopez does look and any older after a quarter of a century, but George Clooney does?

I wondered if I could find some other of Mr. Leonard’s work. Nice, Get Shorty from 1995 is available on Max. This is a masterpiece of casting, all the actors totally inhabit their characters and the comedy tamps down the violence just the right amount.

There was a sequel of sorts 10 years later called Be Cool that had John Travolta’s character, Chilli Palmer breaking int the music business like he did the movie business in Get Shorty. I seem to recall that I did start to watch it on DVD back when it came out, but quit part way in because it was disappointing compared to the first flick. Hey, it is available on Max too, maybe I should try it again. Maybe.

I found the much newer Life of Crime on Frevee and once again I’ve seen it before, but is worth a watch again, if just for the big switch at the end. And Switch is the title of Elmore Leonard book that the movie is based on.

Another late 90s gem of an Elmore Leonard movie is Jackie Brown. A somewhat restrained Quentin Tarantino directed it, but it is only on Netflix and that is one of the streaming service I don’t subscribe to, so I can’t rewatch it.

Doing this research I discovered that Elmore is also responsible for 3:10 to Yuma. Wow, I have a digital copy of the 2007 version with Russel Crowe and Christian Bale. I have also seen the 5 decade older version with Glenn Ford and Van elfin. I’d rewatch the 1957 version if I didn’t have to pay $4 to rent it on Amazon.

And The Oscar Goes To…

We didn’t watch the Oscars on Sunday night. Haven’t in a long time either, they used to be a required viewing so that we could see if any of the movies we went to had won any of those shiny gender indistinct statuettes. But we haven’t actually been to the theater to see a movie in quite some time, 2012 is my last mention of that on this blog. And I bet that visit to an actual cineplex was a one off. I know we stopped going out for movies around the beginning of this century because I’ve got an old spreadsheet that lists the discs we rented on Netflix starting in late 1999.

Instead of watching the Oscars on Sunday we watched one of the ten movies nominated for Best Picture, The Holdovers, on Peacock. This was a near perfect movie for us, a quiet character driven movie that is set in and shot in the style of the 70’s. No explosions, no car chases, no bullet ridden bodies or computer generated space battles with hundreds of ships or soldiers.

I have also seen one of the other films of the ten that were nominated, the winner itself, Oppenheimer. It is also available on Peacock, but I didn’t think I could could get Donna to sit still for 3 hours for that. There is one other of the nominees that I could watch, Poor Things which is streaming on Hulu right now, but after watching the trailer, I’m not so sure I could get through the whole thing.

On a side note: Robert Downey Jr. won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in Oppenheimer. I don’t remember seeing him in the movie at all and I don’t know who he played, but I did recognize non-winner Emily Blunt though. This was probably just a testament to Mr. Downey’s acting ability and a case of my secret crush on Ms. Blunt.

Holiday Viewing

Did you know that Iron Man 3 is a holiday movie? I didn’t and I have watched it, albeit several years ago, and don’t remember any Christmasy stuff in it. Well, Plex remembers. When I open the app there on the home page was a section entitled “Home for the Holidays” and Iron Man 3 was right there.

I cued up the movie and watched it. Sure enough there are several scenes that have Christmas decor in the background. In my humble opinion there was not enough to push this to be classified as a holiday movie. I probably last watched it on DVD way back in 2013 when it first came out. Maybe I even got the DVD as a Christmas present that year…still not a Christmas movie.

There were 3 other titles, of the 150 or so movies I have digital copies of, in that “Home for the Holidays” category. And one of those is also a controversial pick, Die Hard. I say no, but the listing gave me an excuse to watch the movie again. Yippie-ki-yay.

Movie number three was definitely a Christmas movie, Elf and this movie is a yearly watch. And we watched it on Thanksgiving weekend when Donna’s brother and family were here.

The last of the four, but not least, was Bad Santa. And I didn’t watch this one this year.

What was conspicuously missing from that list, it even has the word Christmas in the title, was A Moody Christmas. There are two possible reasons for its non-inclusion in the “Home for the Holidays” list. IMDB lists its title as The Moodys without the C word. But probably it is because it is an Australian TV series and TV is already home viewing. This is also a yearly must watch for me during the holidays. There are just six half hour shows with each one covering a dysfunctional family’s annual Christmas lunch in 6 consecutive years.

James Vs His Future Self

As I’ve mentioned here several times before, “I’m a sucker for any time travel related media, books, TV and movies.” So, when I saw this title on Amazon Prime and watched the trailer, I just knew I had to watch it.

First let’s talk about the title, why is versus in the title on Prime Video abbreviated Vs instead of vs. or just vs like in the movie poster? It’s weird.

Great casting with Daniel Stern the the future self, his manic schtick is just right, but… It is lousy casting in that he looks too dissimilar to the present James. He is several inches taller than his current self, but the kicker for me was the pronounced hook on Mr. Stern’s nose was nothing like Jonas Chernick’s smaller and straighter probiscis.

The actors don’t have to look exactly alike, but they could have tried a little harder. I just rewatched Moneyball starring Brad Pitt. There are flashbacks to the younger Billy Beane and the actor who plays the younger version, Reed Thompson, has a very similar facial structure. So if they really wanted Daniel Stern why not find an actor with a bit more of a likeness? The young James is played by Jonas Chernick who co-wrote the movie, so why not get someone with more of a resemblance to him?

Somewhere around the 20 minute mark they even tried to explain the different sizes of the two Jameses. Present James tells future James he doesn’t believe who he is because he is bigger. Future James tells him time travel physically stretches him. Height and just the bridge of the nose? At this point I stepped off the time travel bus.