Geeking out about higher ed since 2013.
Another month has come and gone. September had a wide diversity of fine films featured on Netflix to stream instantly, so definitely check them all out!
Hope you enjoy some or all of these movies!
This week's movie is the 2012 hit, Silver Linings Playbook, starring Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, and Robert De Niro.
I hadn't heard much about this movie before it came out but good word of mouth after its release got me in the theater to watch it, and I am a big fan of this movie. All the actors are great in it and it has a nice takeaway at the end; everyone is a little bit crazy.
Cooper stars as Pat, a former teacher who gets released from a mental hospital in the wake of his wife's adultery, which highlighted his bipolar disorder when Pat beat the man his wife, Nikki, was cheating on him with. Pat is nevertheless determined to win his wife back by bettering himself and proving he can be a better husband, ignoring the fact she wants nothing to do with him. Pat eventually meets Tiffany, played by Lawrence. She is a recent widow and dealing with the aftermath through a sex addiction.
Pay and Tiffany are able to connect through their shared grief and ability to help each other with their own personal goals; Pat hopes to communicate with his ex-wife through Tiffany and Tiffany needs a dance partner for an upcoming competition. They make a deal and end up spending time together rehearsing their routine, bickering throughout. The movie is funny in an odd, sort of dark way. Pat can be terribly obtuse at times but his aloofness can be humorous. Pat's parents, played by De Niro and Jackie Weaver, are eccentric in their own right, along with supporting character Danny, played by Chris Tucker. All the supporting characters help lighten the mood most of the time but there is also some dramatic moments as Pat works to get better through therapy and stumbles from time to time throughout the film.
Much like my previous review of Reign Over Me, this movie provides an interesting, engaging, and entertaining look into mental health, how we deal with it, and how we work to overcome our issues. As I mentioned before, my big takeaway from this movie is that everyone is a little bit crazy, and that's alright. It normalizes our quirks, and encourages us to allow ourselves to accept each other and love one another unconditionally.
I highly recommend this movie. It is well done, well acted, and has a great story.
You can stream it right now on Netflix!
Let me know what you think of this movie and if you have any recommendations for what I should watch next.
This week's movie is 2007's Reign Over Me, starring Don Cheadle and Adam Sandler.
A rare dramatic performance from Sandler, this movie follows Cheadle's character, Alan Johnson, as he seeks to pull Sandler's character, Charlie Fineman, from a deep depression following the loss of Charlie's wife and kids in the September 11 attacks on New York City. Alan and Charlie used to be college roommates and Alan recognizes a disheveled Charlie one day and that is where the story starts. Charlie has retreated into a immature bubble where he refuses to even acknowledge his loss, cutting himself out from the rest of the world.
The main story is supported by Liv Tyler as a counselor who works to help Charlie, and Alan's wife who is played by Jada Pinkett Smith. The story is hard to watch at times, in a sort of neutral way. Charlie is quickly prone to anger when people try to get him to open up and Alan keeps trying to help him, but to no avail. You feel Charlie's emotions strongly but you also feel the frustration of Alan and those around him who are all trying to help Charlie. It gets hard to watch when Charlie is throwing his tantrums right when you think he's getting somewhere, and you just want there to be a happy ending, but there isn't. The movie is raw and real and it makes it a tough watch if you're not looking for something gut-wrenching and emotional.
This movie explores dark nuances of loss and depression that I don't feel like I've seen in a lot of other films. It deals with the compulsion some people have to fix things, and how we can't force any one, even those we care about, to do anything they aren't ready for.
I'd recommend this movie, especially as the national conversation around mental health is ongoing. It was a movie ahead of its time, I feel, and is definitely worth a viewing now.
You can stream Reign Over Me right now on Netflix.
This week's film comes to us via Netflix, and is 1996's Trainspotting, starring Ewan McGregor, Jonny Lee Miller, & Robert Carlyle, among others.
I've had this film in my queue for quite a while. So long I don't even remember why I put it there in the first place. I know it's a classic film with its own sort of reverence and respect in the film world. After watching it, nearly twenty years after it came out, I can see why it was so engaging to folks. It's a highly unique, stylistic, surreal, fast-paced movie that leaves you disoriented, but still getting a fun ride and a interesting character study in the process.
Ewan McGregor's Renton is the main character, and the story follows his journey to get clean, literally and figuratively. He and his friends are addicted to drugs but Renton is looking to get off the stuff and clean up his life and go straight. A great deal of the interesting elements of the film come from Renton's struggles with drug use and the trippy sequence when he is in withdrawals. Most of the movie is Renton's narration, so you're able to get behind his actions and hear what he is thinking versus imagining it. It is done in such a way to not belittle the audience's intelligence, but to provide a more complex context to the happenings in the film. We also see how Renton's actions affect others, which is a nice touch too. Most of the movie could be watched being against Renton, since he is very morally gray. It makes for an interesting story, that I would liken in spirit to something like Breaking Bad, where you're rooting for and against the main character at different times.
My only criticisms might be that the other characters seem sort of two dimensional at times. It is Renton's show to be sure, but the other folks just seem to be a one trick pony or even just sort of vanish altogether. It's not a major gripe, but the most evident one I can think of.
That being said, I definitely recommend Trainspotting. It has a cinematic vibe similar to Scott Pilgrim VS The World in the way it is edited and shot, so I was definitely sold on it in that way.
You can stream Trainspotting now on Netflix!
Welcome to this monthly wrap-up of my weekly movie reviews!
In an ongoing effort to better serve up my content to you all, here is what I watched in the month of August. Enjoy!
This week's movie is Heathers from 1988, which comes to us via Netflix and stars Christian Slater and Winona Ryder.
The basic premise of the classic movie is that a high school student named Veronica (Ryder) is fed up with her clique-y group of popular friends, the "Heathers", and wishes they would just go away. In comes Slater's character who has a deadly solution. It all seems like fun and games until the bodies start to pile up and the whole school is thrown into chaos. Think Mean Girls just with more guns, death, and mayhem.
The movie isn't terribly gory or violent. It is also rather cheeky and silly at times. It's a mash-up of genres for sure, a dark, comedic, thriller where Ryder is forced to deal with her problems maturely. There is a lot going on thematically but it all works. There is also cliche 80s and high school stereotypes in the movie, which is great decades apart from the time this movie came out. You have your overly dorky nerds, stupid cops, aloof parents, and dimwitted jocks. The dialogue in this movie is also pretty incredible, with zingers, one-liners, and quotables all over the place. It's a lot of fun and gives the movie its unique flavor.
My only gripe, which I totally acknowledge comes from me being in 2014 and this movie being nearly as old as I am, is that a major sequence in the film is about how the jocks are pranked and made to look like they're gay, which is apparently the worst thing in the world. It was certainly a different time back then.
I recommend this movie as a pretty solid popcorn movie you don't have to think too much about but it is certainly smarter than it looks.
You can check out Heathers streaming now on Netflix!
This week's movie comes to us from Netflix (note: it went off the service 9/1/14, but it seems to keep popping up on streaming services and is one I've wanted to watch for a while) and is 1979's Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
I've seen pretty much all of the Star Trek feature films, and I have to unfortunately admit, this one is another miss. It just doesn't seem like the best parts of the series translate well to the big screen. This movie isn't terrible, it just seems to be confused and sort of full of itself.
My first big complaint with this movie is a long winded sequence of Kirk riding around outside the Enterprise. I understand that this was the first time it was seen on the big screen but just for the sake of pacing, it seemed to be overdone. Pacing was generally a problem with this movie, and it was made over 30 years ago so there is that but not all classic films has this issue. The best ones stand the test of time.
All of the original cast is back for this adventure, an eager Kirk is ready to take the helm again, a beleaguered Spock is looking for logical enlightenment, and the rest of the team is their usual selves. The main plot of the movie is intriguing enough, but the only real pay off is at the end with an interesting twist as to the reveal of what this alien entity is that the Enterprise crew is trying to stop from destroying Earth.
Perhaps I can't give it a completely fair shake since I saw most of the other Star Trek films first but this one just feels tired and overdone. It doesn't have the heart or interesting moral dilemmas of the show and doesn't really come close for me to any of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Maybe I'd be more invested if I watched the original series, but I haven't so my stance is that this one is a skippable entry in the film series.
Come back next week for another movie to check out!
This week's movie is the classic 1985 film, The Breakfast Club, coming to us via Netflix.
I have to admit, I love this movie and have always loved this movie. I haven't sat down to watch in a while but it definitely holds up. The basic premise is that a group of high school students have to spend a Saturday in detention for various reasons. They are all basically your typical stereotypes; jock, nerd, popular kid, the loner, and the misfit. The movie is so simple since all the plot entails is just getting these five people stuck in a room together and letting the rest play itself out. Judd Nelson's misfit John Bender is one who begins to instigate the others to divulge things about themselves. Where at first all of these starkly different stereotypical high school students thought they had nothing in common, by the end of the day, they realize they're more similar than they ever thought.
I love how simple and minimalist this movie is. It completely hinges on the characters and the actor's performances, and they all succeed greatly. Each character is nuanced and has their own moments to shine. Nelson is certainly a highlight of the movie and provides most of the film's quotable moments. Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, and Emilio Estevez all provide great turns here, and Ally Sheedy is very intriguing as the quirky Allison. I wish I could have a whole movie of her!
The Breakfast Club should be required viewing in high schools. It breaks down those foolish misconceptions we have about each other that put up walls and separate us. Every one has their own problems and we all want the same things in life, to be loved, appreciated, and to be able to pursue our own dreams. I feel like this is going on a continuing list of great films I have to show my children when they grow up. Even after almost thirty years, this timeless classic is still relevant today. Plus, it has that great Simple Minds song in the soundtrack! It's just great all around!
I highly recommend The Breakfast Club, which is streaming now on Netflix.
This week's movie comes to us from Netflix, and it is 2011's Jiro Dreams of Sushi.
This documentary is a exploration of the unique character of Jiro Ono, a master sushi chef from Japan whose commitment to his work and craft is unparalleled. He has a world renowned restaurant that only has about ten seats and charges thousands of dollars per customer. The film examines Jiro's story, perspective on life, and his relationship with his sons, who will eventually take over for their venerable father.
I must give a major caveat to the viewing of this movie; it is completely subtitled, obviously since it is centered in Japan. I know this could be a deterrent for some folks so I figure I'd make sure it was known ahead of time. I didn't know but it is still a great viewing experience. The movie is very well shot and has some awesome sequences of Jiro making his amazing sushi. The only complaint I'd have with the composure of the film is that has fairly slow pacing and there is no sense of urgency or conflict. It is all just talking heads and informational interviews with people around Jiro. There isn't a problem to be solved or crisis to avert or call to action. It's just a monument and memorial to Jiro, simple and clean, just like the man it is for.
I enjoyed this movie enough and if you're like me and love sushi, you'll want to run out and get some after watching.
You can stream this movie right now over at Netflix! Enjoy!
This week's movie, 2008's In Bruges, comes courtesy of Netflix. I've had this movie recommended and have known of it since its release but never really given it much consideration. I unfortunately had the right idea, since this wasn't really my kind of movie. I think it is a good movie so I want to highlight it here but this isn't going to be a glowing recommendation from me.
In Bruges stars Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson as two hitmen who have to go into hiding in Bruges, Belgium after a bad job. Their boss, played by Ralph Fiennes, is an eccentric maniac who eventually comes looking for them to clean up after their mess.
The movie's plot is basically a dark action comedy, but it is pretty light on the action and the comedy is very dry, so know that going in. I know some people love dry comedy and I can appreciate it myself but this movie's comedy is pretty low-key and subtle as well as being sort of just out of my usual sensibilities. Much of the story is character based, since we're essentially just hanging out with Farrell and Gleeson's characters as they waste time in Bruges. Farrell is sorrowful and slightly unhinged, and Gleeson is a stoic man looking to do the right thing.
I just couldn't get into this movie. It is an original movie that is quirky enough and has an interesting setup but I found myself left just sort of scratching my head at the end. It all didn't seem to have much of a point besides being a sort of feature-length movie that talked a lot about how pretty Bruges is.
I'll leave this one up to you all. Check it out and let me know what you think either way. I'd be very curious to see what you make of it.
You can check out In Bruges, streaming now on Netflix!