Excited for both, but as a New England boarding school alum, The Holdovers is really calling my name. My local Drafthouse has been showing the trailer nonstop.
So many movies/tv shows get this world exactly wrong (shakes fist at Gilmore Girls's Chilton, which is almost impressive in its near total miss rate). More often that not it feels like things are being written based on stereotypes rather than anyone's actual experience or research. Obviously you can't tell completely from a trailer but the 3 minutes I saw of The Holdovers rang true to me.
Didn't realise The Killer was getting a theatrical release, I signed up to Netflix again for a month to catch it (and the Fall of the House of Usher). No sign of it in my local arthouse, though they do seem to be screening a 4K restoration of Oldboy and a lot of screenings of something called "Dicks: the Musical".
It's alright, I've done 5/8 so far. Flanagan has not hit the heights of Hill House in his Netflix miniseries since, that one was genuinely scary. There's some inventive gore (looking at you, episode 2) and I'm curious about the overall mystery, but every episode has a very precise formula.
Midnight Mass is probably second for me, I liked it a lot. It was, though, at no point even remotely scary, which I guess Flanagan kind of stopped trying to be after Hill House. Also it felt a little like Hamish Linklater was from a completely different kind of show, much looser and more freewheeling, which honestly I liked a lot, but it put a bit into contrast how much Flanagan likes clean, multi-paragraph monologue for all of his characters to deliver to each other.
In terms of pure scares, yeah, Hill House is head and shoulders above everything else. In terms of the overall story arc, I like Midnight Mass better. It's been discussed to death on the internet, but Hill House felt like it had a strong central metaphor/theme until it completely abandoned it in the last episode.
Linklater had a few multi-paragraph monologues- maybe he just delivered them in a way that felt fresher. IThose aren't my fav part of Flanagan projects but I've accepted them as the price of entry.
Midnight Mass is also my favorite; I found Linklater really compelling, but there’s something about him for me I guess. He was also one of my favorite things about Legion.
I watched the first 30 minutes of Usher before I had to leave to take my son to Five Nights at Freddy’s tonight and Usher set the hook well and quickly enough that I’ll be back to it soon.
(FNAF, the game, has always been a thing that my son loves. If you don’t love the game, don’t waste time on that movie. But my kid geeked out and had a blast).
I’m genuinely angry that I can’t see The Killer in a theater. I don’t live in LA or NY, but Nashville isn’t nowhere; we were blessed with Oppenheimer in 70mm IMAX, for Pete’s sake.
My closest options appear to be Atlanta and Indianapolis and it makes me want to hire Fassbender’s character to find Netflix executives. And I have a great setup at home, it just isn’t the same, no matter how good your home setup is. And I think, given the current word of mouth, that this movie could actually make money. I have to believe that Fincher doesn’t love this situation, but who knows?
Even though I love the movie American Psycho, I wonder if there could be a reboot that highlights the feverish anticapitalism aspect of it more than the Harron film... Every time I think of Fight Club, I think this way about American Psycho...
Very curious if Fincher or someone else on the creative team ever saw or played the HITMAN: World of Assassination games, because The Killer definitely reminded me of royally fucking up a mission and having to improvise my way out. It's kind of subversive to have him be so bad at his job, at least compared to how these flicks normally go.
I really enjoyed The Holdovers, which I saw on opening night in my city in significant part because of the very positive review here. I was pretty upset when I learned last week that the director has been accused of raping a minor, and which was compounded by the realization that none of the places I had seen extolling the virtues of this movie mentioned this accusation. Would you be willing to share why that info was not included in your write-up about the movie?
Another A+ week for new releases. It’ll be weeks before I get to see either of these, though.
Excited for both, but as a New England boarding school alum, The Holdovers is really calling my name. My local Drafthouse has been showing the trailer nonstop.
So many movies/tv shows get this world exactly wrong (shakes fist at Gilmore Girls's Chilton, which is almost impressive in its near total miss rate). More often that not it feels like things are being written based on stereotypes rather than anyone's actual experience or research. Obviously you can't tell completely from a trailer but the 3 minutes I saw of The Holdovers rang true to me.
Didn't realise The Killer was getting a theatrical release, I signed up to Netflix again for a month to catch it (and the Fall of the House of Usher). No sign of it in my local arthouse, though they do seem to be screening a 4K restoration of Oldboy and a lot of screenings of something called "Dicks: the Musical".
I've heard DICKS is fun (yeah, I know how that reads), we just didn't get to it. How are you liking USHER?
It's alright, I've done 5/8 so far. Flanagan has not hit the heights of Hill House in his Netflix miniseries since, that one was genuinely scary. There's some inventive gore (looking at you, episode 2) and I'm curious about the overall mystery, but every episode has a very precise formula.
Would you put Hill House over Midnight Mass? In my mind, Midnight Mass is basically perfect, especially if you go in totally fresh like I did.
Midnight Mass is probably second for me, I liked it a lot. It was, though, at no point even remotely scary, which I guess Flanagan kind of stopped trying to be after Hill House. Also it felt a little like Hamish Linklater was from a completely different kind of show, much looser and more freewheeling, which honestly I liked a lot, but it put a bit into contrast how much Flanagan likes clean, multi-paragraph monologue for all of his characters to deliver to each other.
In terms of pure scares, yeah, Hill House is head and shoulders above everything else. In terms of the overall story arc, I like Midnight Mass better. It's been discussed to death on the internet, but Hill House felt like it had a strong central metaphor/theme until it completely abandoned it in the last episode.
Linklater had a few multi-paragraph monologues- maybe he just delivered them in a way that felt fresher. IThose aren't my fav part of Flanagan projects but I've accepted them as the price of entry.
Midnight Mass is also my favorite; I found Linklater really compelling, but there’s something about him for me I guess. He was also one of my favorite things about Legion.
I watched the first 30 minutes of Usher before I had to leave to take my son to Five Nights at Freddy’s tonight and Usher set the hook well and quickly enough that I’ll be back to it soon.
(FNAF, the game, has always been a thing that my son loves. If you don’t love the game, don’t waste time on that movie. But my kid geeked out and had a blast).
a lot of people seem to like it, but MM was by far my LEAST favorite of his first three series
I love how the trailer for THE HOLDOVERS is shot 70s-style, right down to the fonts.
And the partial voiceover too! Loved that aspect of the trailer, although I feel like waiting until Christmas to watch this
I’m genuinely angry that I can’t see The Killer in a theater. I don’t live in LA or NY, but Nashville isn’t nowhere; we were blessed with Oppenheimer in 70mm IMAX, for Pete’s sake.
My closest options appear to be Atlanta and Indianapolis and it makes me want to hire Fassbender’s character to find Netflix executives. And I have a great setup at home, it just isn’t the same, no matter how good your home setup is. And I think, given the current word of mouth, that this movie could actually make money. I have to believe that Fincher doesn’t love this situation, but who knows?
Even though I love the movie American Psycho, I wonder if there could be a reboot that highlights the feverish anticapitalism aspect of it more than the Harron film... Every time I think of Fight Club, I think this way about American Psycho...
Very curious if Fincher or someone else on the creative team ever saw or played the HITMAN: World of Assassination games, because The Killer definitely reminded me of royally fucking up a mission and having to improvise my way out. It's kind of subversive to have him be so bad at his job, at least compared to how these flicks normally go.
I really enjoyed The Holdovers, which I saw on opening night in my city in significant part because of the very positive review here. I was pretty upset when I learned last week that the director has been accused of raping a minor, and which was compounded by the realization that none of the places I had seen extolling the virtues of this movie mentioned this accusation. Would you be willing to share why that info was not included in your write-up about the movie?