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I was at a horror fest at an upstate NY drive in this weekend, and I must confess I kept watching PEARL on another screen, thinking "Damn, that looks good."

Also: MORE HAMM FLETCH PLZ

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All three of these look pretty good! How often does that happen?

Me very happy to hear that Confess, Fletch change tone away from Chevy Chase films, as "white guy being dick to everyone" played very well in 1980s and not at all since. (Although me do still feel like Jason Lee could have pulled it off had that iteration of Fletch gotten off ground; he always too goofy to feel all that malicious). And of course any time someone manage to put Hamm's two great talents of being funny and incredibly good looking to use it worth celebrating.

And me had thought about Pearl — what's shortest gap between movie and sequel being released? Even planned sequels like Matrixes and Star Warses get few years between releases. And me not feel like Pearl was planned until after X was done. Me respect on-time-and-under-budgetness of it all!

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How about Back to the Future 2 and 3? Or are we only talking about original and first sequel?

My understanding is that Pearl was filmed (like BttF 2 & 3) pretty much simultaneously with X. Is that right?

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Me had forgotten those were only six months apart! And Wikipedia says Ti West and Mia Goth had idea for Pearl while they were filming X, so they were filmed back to back but no one plan on doing that, it just happen organically!

Only similar thing me can think of happening is, when Wayne Wang was filming Smoke with Harvey Keitel, he was so ahead of schedule and under budget, he had six extra shooting days, and they filmed second, largely-improvised movie, Blue In Face. Me mostly just remember Lou Reed has cameo, and this terrific line: "Me getting ready to move out of New York. Me have been getting ready for 30 years. Me almost there."

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It's amazing that West, Goth and crew could pivot so quickly and so successfully to a film in an entirely different style.

I love that Lou Reed line, and boy can I relate to it.

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The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo trilogy? All three installments were released in their (partly) native Denmark in the same calendar year.

Special mention to the Missing In Action franchise, where the intended sequel was released a year before the original, uh, original.

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Me not knew that!

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I'm happy to have caught CONFESS, FLETCH this afternoon. Thoroughly enjoyable. Only occasionally did I sense the shade of Chevy Chase hovering behind Hamm, but then again, only occasionally did I sense the shade of the original novels hovering behind Chase in his flicks. Hamm is a much better fit for Fletch's beach-bum persona, and I really like the shaggy amiability of the ensemble. Especially fun to see Hamm and Slattery together slinging zingers in a new setting.

I can understand updating the police detective from the novel to Roy Wood Jr.'s Slo-mo Monroe, but the original Flynn was a quirky and distinct enough character to go solo in four novels of his own. I like Wood, but Monroe doesn't seem like a character that could headline a movie. Of course, given the fact that I only learned of this movie a few days ago from Scott's Twitter, one can infer that no one at the studio thought Fletch could headline a movie these days either.

I hope Hamm's Fletch gets another outing.

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Awesome. Glad you had the chance to check it out.

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How do I watch PEARL?

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It’s in theaters currently. Streaming date hasn’t been announced as far as I can tell.

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"It’s a case of fact and fiction not squaring up, but that’s hardly a rarity when it comes to historical dramas, and The Woman King never really tries to hide the 21st century attitudes it brings to the 19th century past."

This was pretty much my reaction and the apt response to the people who are suddenly up in arms about total historical accuracy now that it's portraying some else's history. Also Lashana Lynch is a superstar. She's always in the process of stealing the whole movie.

Can't wait to see the other two. Top of my list.

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Exactly. It's definitely something worth noting and the facts make the ending of the movie feel kind of deceptive. (I won't spoil it.) But, wow, were a bunch of people who ordinarily don't pipe up about historical accuracy suddenly very mad about this particular movie's liberties.

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Definitely worth noting.

Good rule of thumb is that if a historical epic ends with "then they made great decisions from then on," it's selling you swampland in Florida. The exception being the final title card in BARRY LYNDON.

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