| Aces Go Places 2 | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | The Aces Go Places series is a series of martial arts comedies meant to be pastiches of the James Bond series. | ||||||||
| Aces Go Places 3 | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | The third film in the series is much more overt in terms of the spy films and TV series its parodying, including guest appearances by Richard Kiel and Peter Graves. | ||||||||
| Aces Go Places 4 | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Aces Go Places 5 | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Aesop’s Fables: The 1920s | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Agatha Christie: Why Didn’t They Ask Evans | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Alfie (2004) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Babe | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Back to the Future | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Backfire (1950) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Basket Case (Arrow) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Betrayed (1954) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Big Heat (Hong Kong, 1988) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | Hong Kong action film with a very convoluted production history, which I can’t clearly find information about the premise of. | ||||||||
| Big Short | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Black Phone 2 | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Breakfast Club (Criterion Collection) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Cheech and Chong’s Last Movie | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | Documentary film about Cheech and Chong’s career. | ||||||||
| CODA | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | Winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture of 2021. This is the first physical release outside of Italy; it was made for Apple TV+. | ||||||||
| Dead Zone (1983) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Dillinger (1945) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Dragon Ball Super: Broly – The Movie | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Dressed to Kill | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Dusk Maiden of Amnesia | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | Paranormal investigation anime. | ||||||||
| Flight | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Flight of the Phoenix | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Forrest Gump | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Godzilla (1954) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Great Escape | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Happy’s Place | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Hard Boiled | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | John Woo’s last big film in Hong Kong before his big 90s Hollywood excursion, and a film that is absolutely spectacular. | ||||||||
| Hatsune Miku Magical Mirai | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | This is a Hatsune Miku concert film, from one of the Magical Mirai shows in Japan – not sure if it’s the most recent one or not. (Note on songs for Vocaloids like Hatsune Miku – they are written by people, and the instruments in the concerts and on the recordings you’ll find on Spotify and elsewhere are performed by humans.) | ||||||||
| Hedda | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Minority Report | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Monk (Kino-Lorber) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Nocturne | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Outland (Arrow) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Planes, Trains, and Automobiles | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Profile of Mona Lisa | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | This is a concert film for J-Pop singer Ado (who did, among other things, the opening and closing for the most recent Cat’s Eye series). | ||||||||
| Red House (1947) | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Regarding Henry | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Rosemary’s Baby | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | Directed by Roman Polanski | ||||||||
| Rules of Engagement | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Sasuke | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | 1968 Ninja Anime series, about a young ninja of the Sarutobi Ninja clan training to seek revenge against the Tokugawa Shogunate for his parents’ murder. | ||||||||
| Scrooged | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Smashing Machine | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Snowden | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Soul Food | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Spotlight | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Comments | Winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture of 2015. | ||||||||
| This Woman is Dangerous | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Vampires | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Waltzing with Brando | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
| Wayne’s World 2 | |||||||||
| Amazon | |||||||||
Finally, the picks of the week. Alex says, “My 4K UHD release of the month is, easily, Hard Boiled – if you’re getting in to John Woo’s Hong Kong fare, the best jumping on points are either this, The Killer, or A Better Tomorrow. Otherwise, as an anime pick, I’m actually going to go with the Hatsune Miku Concert video – Miku has become an international phenominon, and the best ways to be introduced to Miku are, well, either the concerts or the rhythm video games.” Blaine says, “I consider The Breakfast Club, Spotlight, Back to the Future, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and Monk all to be `must own’ titles. Fortunately, with the exception of CODA, all of them have had multiple previous home video releases, so those collection gaps will be mostly filled by now.”
The original Alfie is a great movie and I don’t know why they needed to remake it.
Back to the Future is well worth it — the first one is an almost perfect movie. My unpopular opinion is that I don’t really like the third one as much.
The Breakfast Club is one of those movies that didn’t work for me at all. Possibly not having grown up/gone to school in the US had a lot to do with it.
The Dead Zone is a movie I remember watching as a kid, and is worth watching just to get the references in a Halloween Simpsons episode.
Does Forrest Gump hold up? It was an incredible phenomenon when it came out.
Hard Boiled is an amazing action movie, possibly my favourite John Woo film. Spectacular is right!
Ah, the last good Indiana Jones movie.
And the first not great Wayne’s World movie…
There are a lot more noteworthy movies this week but I have to get to work!
The Breakfast Club is a pretty good example of a movie that has not held up. Molly Ringwald’s essay on it a few years back nails a lot of the reasons why.
And then there’s Rosemary’s Baby, a legitimately brilliant piece of cinema that some people may never watch, and I get that. But it’s a masterpiece of (mostly) understated horror.
Definitely going to look into CODA. My wife studied ASL in college and this has been on our watch list for a bit (just don’t have Apple+).
Flight of the Phoenix is the remake (with Dennis Quaid). It’s good, but the original is much better.
Planes, Trains, and Automobiles is my favorite John Hughes movie. Great for Thanksgiving.
Big Short is excellent. It’ll make you mad since we learned jack from the events, but if you’re unfamiliar with the causes of the 2008 housing crash, check it out.
Scrooged is probably my second favorite Christmas Carol adaptation (after Muppets).