Nightmare Alley

Slow to start, but once it gets going a really terrific film with excellent performances, cinematography, and overall craftsmanship. 

Del Toro practically never misses, even the least of his films are at least entertaining, and while this isn't quite his best, (that honour still goes to the magnificent Pan's Labyrinth) it's yet another feather in his cap as a supremely talented director.

A lot of people seemed disappointed with Nightmare Alley but I wasn't one of them. Good stuff.

I just watched X (2022) recently, it's a surprisingly-decent slasher horror film that pays a LOT of homages to Texas Chainsaw Massacre, mainly the original. As in, several scenes and locations looked like they were ripped straight out of Texas Chain Saw Massacre. There's some other notable horror homages in there, too, but I had a good time with it. I'll take that all day because a lot of slasher movies, as fun as they may be in their action, are not very good movies at the end of the day (looking at you, Friday the 13th). I can sit down and enjoy either version of My Bloody Valentine, but I know it's not actually a good movie.

Just started watching The Time Traveler's Wife on HBO Max, liking it so far. Interesting concept for an HBO series.

While it wasn't quite as visually impressive as some of the other episodes in the series, I had no idea that one of the episodes of LDR I was watching was rendered in real time:

Goes to show you how fast the tech is advancing that it can hang with offline renders from huge and expensive farms.

I just watched Harold and Kumar: Escape From Guantanamo Bay for the first time in ages. The first 15-20 minutes are hilarious shit, especially the plane scene (I LOL'ed at "HE SAID HE GOT A BOMB!" ROFLMAO ), then after that, it fizzes out. It's a solid comedy with some funny moments, but nothing I'd want to go back and rewatch over again.

I also watched Everything Everywhere All At Once the other day, and it's a wonderfully-made film with plenty of heart and laughs. I highly suggest you check that out if you haven't already, it deserves all its accolades.

Nice can't remember much about that one.. that one where they go to Amsterdam? The first one is pretty funny as stoner comedies go, and the second was decent iirc xP Not really into them kinda movies anymore but some of the hilarious scenes are definitely lol worthy.

I tried getting into Everything Everywhere but couldn't get into it.. might have to try and give it another go.

Recently, watched Invincible and memes aside.. it brilliant stuff. Along the veins of The Boys. Brutal, yet captivating world of super 'heroes'. Also completed Season 3 of the Boys which was excellent. Not quite as good as last season but pretty great overall. Ending though was a little anticlimactic after a big build up.

Stranger Things S4. Ngl I didn't really rate the season, while there were some big reveals in there which was cool. There was A LOT of suspension of disbelief in this with many characters having more plot armor that you could shake a stick at (more-so than usual), some poor acting and rushed story feels a little underwhelming after some excellent seasons. A decent watch if a little underwhelming.

I've struggled to come up with anything interesting to say about some of the stuff I've watched lately. One of those was the new Thor movie but Pitch Meeting put it better than I could:

I didn't hate it, but there were a LOT of missed opportunities and odd tonal choices. The latter was a problem in Ragnarok as well but that was better executed over all.

Trying to watch the MCU films again. I’m just going to conclude they aren’t my thing. I haven’t found any particular film I’ve liked. They all seem a little samey to me as well. Although, I did enjoy a short I watched featuring a couple of bank robbers using an alien blaster. But that hardly counts.

I don’t dislike all super hero films. In fact, I quite enjoy Logan, the Deadpool films, the Blade films, Watchmen, some of the Batmans, X-Men: First Class, and the Amazon Prime series The Boys.

Blade Runner: Black Lotus: Lousy writing, decent action when it doesn't get carried away. The character models suck but the animation can be great when it wants to. Surprisingly decent soundtrack oddly reserved for the credits of each episode. The world of Blade Runner is still fun to explore.

Carnival Row: The lukewarm critical reception put this one in my backlog for a long time but it shouldn't have. I think they really underrated this one and I enjoyed it a lot. Excellent production values and world building, an engrossing and entertaining setting, and a surprisingly good performance out of Cara I didn't know she had in her. This show obviously isn't cheap to produce and I worry it's not getting the buzz to justify its expense, but I hope Season 2 releases soon and it gets the support it needs for a full, healthy series.