18 Comments

Kind of excited for Hit Man (though I’ll probably end up waiting for streaming). Everybody Wants Some is still the best use of Glen Powell, I was sure he’d become a movie star as soon as I saw it. Have doubted my ability to perceive such things over the past few years but it looks like he’s getting there.

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HIT MAN rules. I liked it more than Keith, I think. It pairs so well with the other Linklater/Hollandsworth joint, BERNIE, too, in that it's been carefully crafted around its star (and in close collaboration with its star) and deals with the same fluidity with which a person can slip from one role to another.

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BERNIE, still my go to movie recommendation for either ppl whose taste I don't know or a giant group with very mixed tastes. Because who doesn't love BERNIE? If that person exists, I haven't met 'em yet.

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Bernie is wonderful. It absolutely nails the flavors of weirdness found in a small town. And every small town used to have a Bernie (maybe still do, haven’t socialized in one in a while), minus the act that led to the freezer. We hope.

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This would be a good piece for this Substack- who did you immediately think would be a huge star and how did it end up?

For me, it was Jennifer Lawrence in Winter's Bone (nailed it!) and Elizabeth Olsen in Martha Marcy May Marlene (she got there eventually?). I also thought Guy Pearce would be the main superstar coming out of LA Confidential, shrug.

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See it with a crowd if you can--went on Monday and it played real well with an audience

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Glen Powell is still getting the slightly narrowed side-eye from me -- I'm not yet sure he's more than a young Ryan Reynolds, but I'm willing to be convinced otherwise.

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But a young Ryan Reynolds did Van Wilder and never stopped! Glen Powell has committed no such crimes!

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That's true! I don't know, they both have an "activate smile muscles" uncanniness I can't get past. Yet!

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"activate smile muscles" why do you think Tom Cruise hired him got TG:Maverick?

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I'm in on Powell!

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Me sure me not first person to pose this question, but is Linklater our best working director who not have any particular style? Could anyone else have done Before movies, School of Rock, Waking Life, and this movie equally well?

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Would Soderbergh be a competitor? It's not like either makes style-less movies, but I don't know I could describe the trademarks of either, outside of similar projects. (The OCEANS and BEFORE films all feel of a piece, for instance.)

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Yeah, Soderbergh very good choice. And me also thought of Coens immediately after posting, although me think they have fixed number of modes they work in, moreso than other two.

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I will say that the chemistry between Powell and Arjona is fantastic, and hotter than anything in CHALLENGERS, dare I say

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"It’s a Venn diagram for appreciators of Béla Tarr and dismemberments. "

ohhhh yes!

"Frankly, that makes it sound a little cooler than it turns out to be."

ohhhhhh no.

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I’m quite a bit higher on IN A VIOLENT NATURE than Scott is, in spite of what appears to be a failure of nerve in the home stretch. I’m planning on going back again this weekend to see if the ending plays better when you know it’s coming.

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Yeah, I'm cheered by the film's success because it's trying something exciting and it's done with impressive rigor.

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