Thursday, April 30, 2020

Films That I Saw: April 2020



It’s almost the end of the month and since February, things have gotten scary and now that there’s more than a million of cases here in the U.S. which is a third of the cases around the world and over 60,000 deaths in the U.S. out of 217,000 around the world. For a country that’s supposed to have the best of everything and to have all of things needed like this, there is really only question I have to ask those at the White House. Better yet, I’ll let William Hurt ask the question:




This country is supposed to be at top of everything despite its flaws. George W. Bush read a book about the 1918 Spanish flu and had thoughts about creating a pandemic task force despite the people he had around him. Say what you want about Bush as a president and he was a terrible president but he at least would’ve taken some action and do something about this. Barack Obama would’ve handled this immediately. Now, we have a human septic tank as our dictator who suggests “hey, eat a Tide pod, swallow disinfectants, go have a tan outside, and you’ll feel better.” Of course, he claims he was being sarcastic but he also says this and claims that he’s smarter than all of us. My one-year old nephew is learning to walk and he knows how to bend down on his knees and does it with much patient and he’s a hell of a lot smarter than this shit sandwich.

It’s not just the White House where things are just awful but also here in Georgia as our shit-for-brains governor recently decided for business, restaurants, bowling alleys, and gyms to be re-opened. It makes living here in Smyrna less safe now as my mother and I recently went to the supermarket a couple of days ago and it was a very depressing feeling there. Everyone looked down and almost zombie-like as if this pandemic had really sucked the life out of everyone. It wasn’t fun. Having to stay home and be safe does get to you as the only time me and my mom went out is either for groceries or take out. The only exception was going to my sister’s house for my nephew’s first birthday as it’s going to take more than a pandemic to stop me from celebrating Mateo’s first birthday with his family.

I can understand having cabin fever and the need to go out even though my mother, myself, my sister, her husband, and their son haven’t been sick. We still have to stay home and be safe. Unfortunately, not everyone gets the program as there’s protests in various states and such about re-opening the country and all of that bullshit. Well, if they get sick and die. That’s their fucking fault. Bitch all you want, you want to live? Stay the fuck home! With some states wanting re-open including another dumb-fuck state that is Florida with its dumb-fuck governor who considers WWE “essential” all because Meekmahan and his cunt-wife paid $18.5 million to PAC and got the OK from their governor while laying off a bunch of people in WWE including longtime referee Mike Chioda and some of my favorites like Zack Ryder, Rusev, and fuckin’ Kurt Angle.

At least there’s some places in the U.S. that are trying to do something and people such as Dr. Anthony Fauci who is trying to help us anyway he can. He’s a good dude and deserves to be listened more. I also want to give praise to New York’s governor Andrew Cuomo and California’s governor Gavin Newsom for at least having the balls to try and do something while taking some responsibility for whatever faults they have in testing and such. That is what leaders are made of. The ones who have the balls and fortitude to take action and responsibility. Not human septic-tanks who blame others for his own fuck-ups.


In the month of April 2020, I saw a total of 42 films 20 first-timers and 22 re-watches with 13 of these first-timers being directed or co-directed by women as part of the 52 Films by Women pledge. The highlight of the month was definitely my Blind Spot Series assignment in One Sings, the Other Doesn't. Here are my top 10 first-timers of April 2020:

1. Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx


2. Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart to Hades


3. Lone Wolf and Cub: Sword of Vengeance


4. The Miseducation of Cameron Post


5. Molly's Game


6. The Birth, the Life, and Death of Christ


7. Zombieland 2: Double Tap


8. Matrimony's Speed Limit


9. Shadowed


10. The Ocean Waif


Monthly Mini-Reviews

Hit It Hard


From 30 to 30 is a documentary about the rollercoaster journey of John Daly who emerged in the early 1990s as an unknown who managed to steal the show at a PGA tournament and became a favorite among the people. The film features an interview with Daly as he wasn’t some rich kid that played the game as he was from a poor background that played golf as a caddie and just managed to get good at the game. Yet, success definitely had its downside for Daly who struggled with it until he got sober and other issues sorted out as he remains a favorite as it is a fun episode of the series.

Shadowed/Good Enough: Making Shadowed




From David F. Sandberg and his wife Lotta Losten comes a three-minute horror short film the two made while under quarantine as it is about a woman whose house loses power due to a storm and she is being haunted by a shadow as she wondered what is going on. Given the circumstances that is made for this short, it is an inventive and chilling horror short that proves that limitations can inspire people to make something great in a matter of a few minutes. The film was accompanied by a making-of documentary about how he and Losten made this short in their home and with the equipment they had as Sandberg shot and edited the film himself as it’s a must for anyone who is interested in the art of filmmaking. Especially as it proves that even though Sandberg has made some big feature films including Shazam! It doesn’t mean that he still has a lot to offer while also finding ways to be creative in these trying times.




Zombieland 2: Double Tap


This made it to Starz recently as I began to watch sporadically for the month as it’s a fun sequel as it has the four main characters on the previous film returning after a decade as they remain a somewhat dysfunctional family who kill zombies. Yet, it is about these four people killing zombies as one of them in Little Rock breaks away from the pack as she stills feel that she is being treated like a child by Tallahassee leading to the gang to find and this place called Babylon where they run into Zoey Deutch who steals the show as the dumb blonde Madison. It’s got lots of violence but it’s also funny as it’s just a fun film to watch.

Top 10 Re-Watches:

1. Captain America: The Winter Soldier


2. Yellow Submarine


3. The Ten Commandments


4. David Bowie: The Last Five Years


5. Captain America: The First Avenger


6. Spider-Man 2


7. Ant-Man and the Wasp


8. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo


9. Searching for Bobby Fischer


10. The Wedding Singer


Well, that is it for April. Other than finishing the Lone Wolf and Cub film series and films on my never-ending DVR list. I am not sure what I’m going to do as I’ve already decided that I’m not going to do the Cannes marathon this year as I will hopefully do it next year if things get to normal. I did stop work on my MCU is Cinema series as I hope get back on writing the fifth part as I often just spend my time playing computer games, do puzzles, watch the HBO documentary series on the Atlanta Child Murders, and listen to a few new records by NIN, Fiona Apple, Pearl Jam, and the Strokes as I recommend those records. I just hope everyone stays home and stay safe as we need to be safe and not worry about going back to the movie theaters until there’s a vaccine. Until then, this is thevoid99 signing off…

© thevoid99 2020

2 comments:

jay said...

If nothing else, my gosh your variety is exciting.

thevoid99 said...

@jay-I try to keep it interesting though some of it is by accident such as Yellow Submarine as I watched a live-stream sing-a-long version of the film on YouTube. It was fun.