See you at the end.

Yeah, I reckon I can skip the first ¾ of the film, find out the “mystery” and watch the end. Saved me a lot of time.

I saw Smile 1 and it was fine - Smile 2 took that basic premise turned it up a notch or two. I went I’m with pretty low.expectations but it really delivered. One of the best horror films of the year.

https://www.businessinsider.com/best-and-worst-movies-this-year-critic-ranking-2024

Borderlands and Madame Web are definitely topinv my list of worst. I’ll give the nod to the latter as the firmer seems to have been almost deliberately sabotaged by the studio, while Madame Web was, apparently, exactly the film Sony wanted to release.

Less about movies I missed and more just ones I didn’t see because: a) I have more… “low brow” tastes than some critics and b) they got showings at film festivals but didn’t necessarily trickle down to movie theatres (and/or they are on streaming platforms).

I will likely get around to some of them, I was trying to catch Anora before it left my local multiplex but couldn’t.

Part 2 was the pay-off for all the set-up in Part 1 and it was a thing of beauty (that B&W sequence really stayed with me). Not my favourite film of the year but a definite contender for top 10.

Deadpool & Wolverine - a blast from start to finish. Probably going to finish the year in my top.three, likely #1.

I just go by the date of first release on IMDb, which should be pretty much the same.as Letterboxd.

Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In - went in pretty blind and loved it, definite Kung-fu Hustle vibes. I’m finalising my top ten of the year but this will end up in the top 3.

Sounds like Joaquin Phoenix is a liability. If the film gets funding because he’s involved but he could drop out at the last minute (they were building sets) then that is a problem.

I try and finish any film I start. I’ve never walked out of a film.but I came close with Henry Portrait of a Serial Killer.because the friend whose idea it was got.close to leaving buy she knuckled down and got.through it. I should have left the Valentine’s Day screening of Nekromantik as it.was far too loud and.it.can’t have done my hearing any good.

Especially as some of the recycled plot points make no sense with the slightly tweaked setting.

Luckily, they didn’t really bother making a sequel, they just remade the original and pretended it was a new film.

Coward!

My main conclusion was that it was nice of them to give Ridley Scott a tonne of cash to remake the first film but with an upbeat ending this time and pretending that it’s a sequel even if the rehashed plot points don’t really work in the context. However, don’t worry about that they’ve turned it up to 11! Instead of the Romans fighting unwashed Germans in a forest, we now have a huge invasion from sea! You liked tigers and chariots in the arena, now we have rhinos and sea battles! You were thrilled by the fridging of one woman to give the main character his motivation, in GladIIator they fridge two!