The Great Movie Conquest of 2022

The Great Movie Conquest of 2022 - July

This month, the focus was on fantasy epics of the 1970s and 80s, and I chose this time period and this genre as an option specifically because I was interested in the state of the genre during that time immediately preceding and following the release of Star Wars in 1977. While this type of movie is the sum and substance of films produced these days, Hollywood didn't always have the resources or experience to pull these off. A lot of fantasy epics made during this time read as inherently goofy to modern audiences. Part of this is the limited effects available at the time, part of this is just the weird tone. There are a rare few gems from this era that are kindly regarded these days (e.g. Time Bandits), but the majority of these offerings don't dare hope for much more than an ironic cult following.

So ... yes, I kind of entered into this challenge expecting a lot of junk food. I wasn't exactly ready to hand out a lot of ten-star ratings. Maybe this wasn't entirely fair of me, but I also can't imagine what kind of mindset I'd have to warp myself into in order to unironically enjoy something like Red Sonja, whose title character barely had a personality. A lot of these films ran into similar issues that gave the finished product a very paper-thin structure. What sinks most of these movies isn't the rudimentary effects, it's poor plotting or poor characters. Star Wars still floated under these conditions because the plotting was strong. In that way, they're actually held to the same standard as any other film, and so I can only feel so bad about giving them low marks.

Just so, I almost had a meaningful experience watching "Masters of the Universe," (featuring a pre-FRIENDS Courtney Cox). I was only really familiar with the "He-Man" franchise through memes, and I think I may have accidentally watched an episode with my younger cousins some twenty years ago. Despite its general incoherence, the movie was just so sincere that I couldn't bring myself to hate it.

Looking at a lot of the (mostly valid) critiques of these kinds of films, I'm reminded of complaints thrown against films like 2018's Aquaman. I think that the film has an overall tighter story than many of those films, but it still chases the flavor of the pre-Jurassic Park adventure film, and a part of that flavor is general shamelessness. In hindsight, I don't doubt that James Wan took deliberate inspiration from many films of this genre and era, especially now that I realize that Wan cast He-Man himself, Dolph Lundgren, in his movie.

Sometimes a movie's ability to move or inspire audiences surpasses its technical prowess. I'm reminded of the 1995 "Power Rangers" movie, a movie that I still gladly watch despite the clear shortcomings of the production value and writing. I think it's possible for the intellectual mind to still have meaningful engagements with these kinds of films, and for serious filmmakers to take inspiration from them.

Of the two reviews I put out this month, only one of them counted toward my challenge. The last half of Stranger Things 4, glorious as it was, didn't technically meet the conditions of the challenge. Meanwhile, Jordan Peele's Nope was an experience to remember. I've shared multiple times on this blog that I'm only a recent convert to the horror genre. Even three years ago, paying to see a big-budget horror film in the theater would have been unthinkable. Even though I've now seen a small handful of horror films on the big screen, I think I'll remember Nope as the first film to give me that flight or fight response that I've at once been chasing and dreading.

Looking outside of this month's theme, I also really responded to 2013's Labor Day. The movie tended to put the cart before the horse in some areas of narrative development, but the movie was still sincere in its presentation, and it succeeded in its ultimate goal of creating a believable romance out of an unbelievable situation.

I'll admit, while I enjoyed many of the films I hit this month (Defiance, At Eternity's Gate, Bright Eyes, etc.), I didn't find as many standouts. This far into the challenge, I can't help but wonder if that's actually because I'm not finding good movies or because I'm developing some kind of resistance to new films. That would be an unfortunate development since I'm little more than halfway through this climb.

I'm curious to revisit many of the films I'm collecting through this challenge, both in the immediate aftermath and in the years to come. I've already tried revisiting some highlights from earlier this year like Pressure Point and Belle to try to further initiate them into my reserve of favored films.

Looking forward, I apologize here and now for not polling the public for next month's theme, but I've known for a while that I wanted to dedicate part of this challenge to watching Netflix original movies, and I decided that August is going to be the lucky month.

Fear not, the polls open back up in September. I like what I did back in April theming my viewings after a specific country of world cinema. Whereas April's options were tailored for countries I was already pretty familiar with, I want to use this chapter to explore countries that I don't know as well. This month, it's down to Poland or Brazil. Cast your votes here.

Thanks for following this challenge. I hope we're all learning something.

--The Professor

Really puts into perspective what Sean Astin brought to the role, doesn't it?

July's Harvest:

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (2022)

Krull (1982)

Period of Adjustment (1962)

Peninsula (2020)

Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970)

The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009)

Red Sonja (1985)

Defiance (2008)
On Moonlight Bay (1951)

Masters of the Universe (1987)

At Eternity's Gate (2018)

Imitation of Life (1959)

Most Dangerous Game (2020)

The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973)

Fences (2016)

The Last Laugh (1924)

The Dark Crystal (1982)

Sing Street (2016)
Viva Las Vegas (1964)
Labor Day (2013)

The Lord of the Rings (1978)
Nope (2022)

Wall Street (1987)

Bright Eyes (1934)
Antwone Fisher (2002)
Witness for the Prosecution (1957)
Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2012)
Return to Oz (1985)

Bohemian Rhapsody (2018)

On the Beach (1959)

A Letter to Three Wives (1949)

Comments

Toy Story 4: Pixar's Tribute to Regression

It was about this time last year that I came across the one person who actually hated Toy Story 3 . I was reading Jason Sperb’s book “Flickers of Film: Nostalgia in the Age of Digital Cinema” as part of my research for my essay on Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Pokemon: Detective Pikachu . It was in one of his chapters on the Pixar phenomenon that he shared his observation from the ending of Toy Story 3 , essentially casting the film as this nostalgia mousetrap for adults: “ If Andy lets go of his childhood nostalgia and moves on, then Toy Story fans don’t really have to , as the narrative recognition in the potential value in such an act is sufficient. Actually moving on becomes indefinitely deferred in an endless cycle of consumption (rewatching the movies, purchasing new versions of the movie, purchasing more and more Toy Story-related merchandise, rewatching them yet again with the next generat...

(Almost) A Love Letter to the "Percy Jackson" Movies

Maybe it's just living through a pandemic-stained world rife where each election feels like a last-ditch effort to rescue liberty from the oblivion, but I'm sometimes nostalgic for the days when the most traumatic thing in my life was a poor adaptation of a favorite book. My generation will remember the film adaptation of the popular YA fantasy book Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan with something like embarrassment, if not outright lividity. The book follows a young teen, Percy Jackson, who discovers that the gods of ancient Greece not only exist, but also sire modern day heroes. As a child of one of these gods, Percy is continually drawn into their Olympian-sized conflicts wherein he gets to prove himself every bit as much a hero as Hercules. Each installment of the five-book series reads like a theme-park ride through Greek mythology as the teens travel across the country battling ancient m...

The Self-Fulfilling Prophecy of Clash of the Titans

Anyone else remember the year we spent wondering if we would ever again see a movie that wasn't coming out in 3D? T hat surge in 3D films in the early months of 2010 led to a number of questionable executive decisions. We saw a lot of films envisioned as standard film experiences refitted into the 3D format at the eleventh hour. In the ten years since, 3D stopped being profitable because audiences quickly learned the difference between a film that was designed with the 3D experience in mind and the brazen imitators . Perhaps the most notorious victim of this trend was the 2010 remake of Clash of the Titans . Why am I suddenly so obsessed with the fallout of a film gone from the public consciousness ten years now? Maybe it's me recently finishing the first season of Blood of Zeus on Netflix and seeing so clearly what Clash of the Titans very nearly was. Maybe it's my evolving thoughts on the Percy Jacks...

Charade: The Shortest Distance Between Two Words

It can feel hackneyed, and even a little lazy, to echo that oft-repeated sentiment that “they really just don’t make ‘em like they used to.” That kind of nostalgic wallowing has us forget that, yeah, even the old masters sometimes produced real stinkers. And it’s also not fair to the many storytellers today who, working against ever turbulent conditions, still manage to create something deeply profound and worthy of the deepest reverences … But there are absolutely times where it’s really easy to believe this anyways. Let me explain by describing my recent experience watching Argylle for the first time earlier this year. The film was designed as a spin-off from the “Kingsmen” franchise and saw poor Bryce Dallas Howard playing Elly, a reclusive spy novelist, whose life is turned upside down when a host of malicious agents converge on her demanding that she write her final book because the events in her novels have predicted real w...

REVIEW: Project Hail Mary

The elements in Project Hail Mary are all mostly straightforward and build to a fairly familiar end: drop an average Joe into an extraordinary situation where he is required to be extraordinary also, and watch extraordinary things happen. This is proven territory. And I spent most of the time drafting this review trying to decide whether that was a point for or against the film, helmed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller--and whether that made a difference for a non-franchise piece like this, the exact kind of film we need to succeed at the box office in order to have a healthy landscape. I think the answer to that question is honestly bigger than any one film, even a reasonably well-done one such as this. But I will say that a movie like Project Hail Mary gives me some hope, and it's my wish that the film continues to find people who will receive it with zeal. And I hope that the people who do will continue to search for other films that they...

Some Much Needed Love for Megamind

Following this year's Oscars ceremony, filmmakers Phil Lord and Chris Miller, directors of The Lego Movie , penned an op-ed for Variety bemoaning the stigma around animated films. They report taking issue with Naomi Scott, one of the presenters for best animated film, saying that animated films are some of the most formative experiences a kid has, and that kids tend to watch these films over and over, further noting "I think some of the parents out there know exactly what I'm talking about." Lord and Miller seemed to take this as implying that adults can't appreciate animated films, saying "Surely no one set out to diminish animated films, but it’s high time we set out to elevate them." I didn't personally find Scott's observation that kids make their parents watch the same animated films over and over again innately demeaning--certainly not any more than Schumer joking that her toddler made he...

REVIEW: Supergirl

Some will say, "We don't need another edgy superhero!" But that's not what makes the utter mediocrity of DC's new Supergirl so devastating. People were saying "We don't need another X superhero" since 2012, and the post-Infinity saga stupor we've slogged through was not triggered by piling one-too-many superheroes onto the camel's back. The Flash sucked because its perversion of the butterfly effect theory was convoluted and ham-fisted. Black Adam sucked because nobody on that film knew what a moral dilemma actually looks like. "Love and Thunder" sucked because, despite what everyone thought in 2017, Waititi's style only barely worked in "Ragnarok" and was not going to work in a script which feels like it was farted out half-past midnight. Supergirl had none of those issues. The real tragedy of Supergirl is that it so easily could have worked. Drifting around the universe has mostly worked for Sup...

Children of a Lesser God: Between Sound and Silence

So ... you all remember how I was really annoyed by The Power of the Dog ? Despite being an early prediction for the big trophy, I found that attempt rather shallow and self-congratulatory. I am more than perfectly fine that the Best Picture award went to the much better CODA . I thought it was much more enjoyable as a piece of film, and unlike The Power of the Dog , it did showed honest interest in the community it was reporting to champion. In the case of CODA , that was, of course, the deaf community. But it's actually not CODA I want to talk about in detail at this time. That movie's milestones exist along a timeline that extends ... further back than I can track today, but at least as far back as March 30, 1987, when Marlee Matlin became the first deaf actor to receive an Academy Award for her performance in Children of a Lesser God . Randa Haines’ 1986 film centers on the romance between a hearing man and a deaf woman a...

REVIEW: HOPPERS

In the 1950s under the threat of nuclear warfare, Hollywood premiered such exercises as The Day the Earth Stood Still or War of the Worlds where an alien power would pass judgment on humankind, holding its fate in its hands. Here in the 2020s under the shadow of such threats as climate change, Hollywood sends to be our judge ... beavers. Let me back up ... Daniel Chong's new film from Pixar Animation, Hoppers , sees Mabel (Piper Curda), a college student whose self-appointed mission is to preserve the glade where she used to find sanctuary with her now deceased grandmother. Her biggest opponent is hometown boy and beloved mayor, Jerry (Jon Hamm), who has designs to plow over the glade in order to open his new freeway--estimated to save travelers four whole minutes of commuting. Mabel gets her golden opportunity when she uncovers secret technology pioneered by her professor which allows a human to rem...

Reveling in the Mixed Messages of Miss Congeniality

In book ten of Metamorphoses, Greek poet Ovid tells the tale of Pygmalion, a talented sculptor living in the height of ancient Greek society. According to the story, Pygmalion’s sculpting prowess was so impeccable that one of his pieces, a marble woman he christened Galatea, was said to be the lovelier than any woman of flesh and blood. Pygmalion was so taken by his creation that he brought her exotic gifts, kissed her marble cheeks, even prepared a luxurious bed for her. Pygmalion so pined to be loved by Galatea that he prayed to the goddess Aphrodite to allow Galatea to reciprocate his love and affection. Aphrodite was apparently in a good mood that day, so she granted Pygmalion’s wish, giving life to Galatea, whom he then wed. The story of Pygmalion is in essence the story of a man who creates his own idealized woman out of whole cloth (or more appropriately, marble), endowing her with all the traits that he finds appealing or alluring. The story also provides a m...

Films and Feelings

Search This Blog