Films That I Saw: May 2024

 

Summer is about to arrive, and it is already getting hot as there is so much shit happening right now as the Israel-Hamas war has gotten worse with our president Joe Biden still showing his support for Israel. OK Joe, enjoy the remaining days of your single term. There has been a lot of shit happening around the world as well as Papua New Guinea’s Enga Province endured one of the worst landslides ever with thousands of people killed. There has been some awful shit here in the U.S. with tornadoes and all sorts of storms and we are not even at the half-way point of the year. This has been quite insane as far as I do what I can to read the news, but I also try to find ways to not be too invested in it as it would be a total fucking downer.

I have been able to find things to escape to as this year’s Cannes Film Festival has always given me some excitement about what to look forward to in the world of cinema. I’m happy for Sean Baker whose newest film Anora won the Palme d’Or as that is a film I’m eager looking forward to as well as Yorgos Lanthimos’ Kinds of Kindness that gave one of its stars in Jesse Plemons the Best Actor prize while Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Perez took home the third-place Jury Prize and the Best Actress prize to its ensemble that includes Selena Gomez and Zoe Saldana. Other winners include the Grand Jury prize winner All We Imagine is Light by Payal Kapadia, the special prize winner to The Seed of the Sacred Fig by Mohammad Rasoulof, Best Screenplay winner The Substance by Coralie Fargeat, and Best Director winner Miguel Gomes for his film Grand Tour are films that I hope to see soon.

While the coverage has been great, the one thing that has put me off about this year’s festival was the numerous reports of standing ovations and that irked me. With Cannes, I usually expect some chaos or dramatic reactions at the screenings with films being booed and howled as that is what makes the festival fun to read about. This year saw some big releases such as Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis and Kevin Costner’s Horizon: An American Saga Chapter 1 all getting these long-standing ovations despite the mixed reviews the films have received. That is weird as I had recently listened to the MUBI podcast on YouTube where Wim Wenders talked about his own experience with standing ovations during a screening for one of his films with Sam Shepherd as they had a long-standing ovation, but it became very uncomfortable for both Wenders and Shepherd after a few minutes in which the latter left the theater because it was overwhelming.

Personally, I would have rather dealt with being booed and I would at least respond to that reaction by giving the audience the finger. That is what Carl Theodor Dreyer did when he screened his final film Gertrud in 1964 as that film was not well-received at the festival yet he went to the stage and flipped off the audience. Those are things that make Cannes so fun as this year’s festival overall felt a bit lackluster for me in the end.

After more than 7 years with a gray HP laptop that I had bought and used as I have written a lot of my work. It was time to get a new one as I bought a brand-new HP Pavilion laptop in its latest form for a lot of money which I am fortunate to have. At the same time, I purchased some software including a new anti-virus and other services that I need including a new Netflix account which I am in control of overseeing. My mother had been complaining about not seeing things in her iPad but with the new account I have created. She is relieved to do that as well as watch her favorite stuff on YouTube. The timing was right as I am now working on the newest version of Microsoft Word with a new editor program that has really done wonders for me as I feel like I can improve as it is going to help me overall.

In the month of May 2024, I saw a total of 23 films in 13 first timers and 10 re-watches with only one film directed/co-directed by a woman as part of the 52 Films by Women pledge. A somewhat underwhelming month although still pretty good as one of the highlights of the month is my Blind Spot film in East of Eden. Here is the top 10 first timers that I saw for May 2024:

1. Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

2. Let It Be

3. Young Ahmed

4. Miracle in Milan

5. Starlet

6. Khaite FW21

7. Snowbird

8. Elton John: Visions

9. Hi-Fi

10. Senior Year

Monthly Mini-Reviews/What Else I am Watching

Wish

For a film that is meant to celebrate the 100th anniversary for Disney Animation Studios, this was a fucking let down as I expected better from Disney. There was a lot of hype for it, but I was worried about it as the animation upon its previews had me worried. I watched the film with my niece and nephew who were both bored by it as it had a terrible story of a young woman who is an idealist that is hoping to become a king’s apprentice, but he refuses to grant her grandfather’s wish. Upon getting a fallen star that can grant wishes, the king gets upset and a lot of dumb shit occurs as I hated how pandering it was while the animation was wobbly in its attempt to make it look like an old hand-drawn animated film with some 3D computer animated movies. It was one of the things that irked me though the only redeeming quality is Chris Pine as the evil king though I felt like his character had some points about not wanting to grant some wishes, but the story did the character no favors. Even the songs that were made for the film were just fucking terrible as this is not a film for kids to see and Disney should have done better.

nothing, except everything

Wow… I have seen some awful shit in my life but goddamn. This is truly one of the worst things I had ever seen as I saw it out of curiosity as it was made by Wesley Wang who was given all this money to make a student film, and this is a film that is HATED by the Letterboxd community. It is this piece of shit which uses quotes by Karl Marx, Carl Jung, and Marya Hornbacher to explain this young man’s existential crisis, but Wang really has no context of who these writers are. All the film is some whiny little fuck who obsesses over the number 7 and what to expect in life as this is just some idiotic millennial bullshit filled with pretty people. The acting is horrible with some offensive usage of music by Beach House as that band should sue Wang. If Wang ever reads this, I hope he kills himself because if this is the future of cinema. FUCK OFF!

Senior Year

A film I saw on Netflix about an Australian teenager who moves to America and hopes to become a popular girl only to fall on her head during a cheerleading routine and then wake up 20 years later realizing how much the world has changed. It is a harmless comedy where Rebel Wilson re-enrolls herself to high school to finish her senior year as there are so many different things that happen. Wilson is hilarious in this as well as being heartfelt as a young woman who had lost much of her life but also her mother as she copes with adulthood as well as trying to realize that high school is not the peak of one’s life. It is a harmless and fun film with a great cast including an amazing cameo from Alicia Silverstone and Angourie Rice as the younger version of Wilson’s character.

Elton John: Visions Before Beyonce popularized the idea of the visual album with 2016’s Lemonade, the first of its kind was Blondie’s 1979 album Eat to the Beat that featured all its songs with a music video for each song. This was before the emergence of MTV as Elton John would create a visual album for his 1981 studio release in The Fox. For many years, the video album had been unavailable until a few days ago as Elton John’s YouTube page released all the videos from that album in a new remastered form. It is quite ahead of its time as well as making the case for being one of John’s more underrated recordings as the 80s was a messy decade for him despite some major hits at that time.

Snowbird



One of three shorts/ads directed by Sean Baker that I saw on YouTube is set in a desert trailer park starring Abbey Lee as a young woman who bakes a cake for many of her neighbors in this small trailer park. Featuring appearances from Mary Woronov and Clarence Williams III, the short is really an advertisement for Kenzo’s 2016 spring/summer collection with Lee wearing one of its clothing. She looks good in the clothes while also adding some naturalism to her performance as well as eating a piece of cake with her neighbors as it is a fun short by Baker.

Khaite FW21



The second short by Baker that I saw on YouTube is a four-minute ad/short commissioned for Khaite’s fall/winter collection as it featured models acting like gangs. Obviously inspired by Walter Hill’s 1979 film The Warriors, it has models walking around acting as a gang doing all sorts of shit with Ace Frehley’s New York Groove playing in the background. It is a fun short to watch and certainly something for fans of Baker to see.

Hi-Fi



The earliest short film of Baker that I saw on YouTube came from 2001 as it is a five-and-a-half-minute short film involving four young teenagers riding around New York City through its tunnels and streets. At first, it feels like this is going to be something fun and innocent until drugs come into play. It is a short that plays into the many themes that Baker has explored in outsiders living away from mainstream society. Even though it has a style that is akin to what was happening at the time, it is really a look into Baker honing his craft as a filmmaker.

Dark Side of the Ring (season finale)

The final episode of the fifth season of this series revolves around the incident known as Black Saturday. It is an event on July 14, 1984, in which WWE had taken over a timeslot on TBS that had previously aired professional wrestling through Georgia Championship Wrestling. It is an event that did mark a major change in professional wrestling as it would put WWE on a national level though it angered many fans of GCW as it revealed a lot into how Jack and Gerald Brisco sold their stakes of GCW to Vince McMahon Jr. much to the anger of Ole Anderson. Gerald Brisco, Jim Cornette, and Ole’s son Bryant Rogowski are among those who are interviewed as it plays into how this event would not only play into McMahon’s rise in professional wrestling but also the beginning of a rivalry with TBS owner Ted Turner though the episode was dedicated to Ole Anderson who died this past February while adding a post-script about McMahon’s most recent departure from WWE due to his many scandals including sex trafficking.

Top 10 Re-Watches

1. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

2. Borat Subsequent Moviefilm

3. Solo Con Tu Pareja

4. What Did Jack Do?

5. Frozen

6. Moana

7. Boomerang

8. Madrid, 1987

9. Dragon Around

10. Sliver

That is all for May. Coming in June will be a few films that I meant to do for my mini-Cannes marathon as well as hopefully a few theatrical releases in Inside Out 2 and Kinds of Kindness. I am not sure what film I will watch as my next Blind Spot film though I am however going to start work on my Auteurs piece on Michael Mann by watching two TV films of his available on YouTube along with The Insider and Ferrari for the rest of the summer. Before I leave, I want to express my condolences to those who have passed away this month including the writer Paul Auster who died at the end of April. Among those who have passed this month include the basketball legend Bill Walton, Elizabeth McRae, film producers Albert S. Ruddy and Fred Roos of The Godfather films, the legendary songwriter Richard M. Sherman, Johnny Wactor of General Hospital, Doug Ingle of Iron Butterfly, filmmaker Morgan Spurlock, actor Darryl Hickman, music composer Jan A.P. Kaczmarek, the great Dabney Coleman, comic book artist Don Perlin, writer Alice Munro, actor/producer Samm-Art Williams, drummer Dennis Thompson of the MC5, drummer John Barbata of the Turtles, Jefferson Airplane/Jefferson Starship, Susan Buckner from Grease, Richard Tandy of Electric Light Orchestra, and the legendary Roger Corman. We will miss you all. This is thevoid99 signing off…

© thevoid99 2024