Tag: movies

  • Streaming Movie Adventures: Soundtrack of a Coup d’Etat

    A long thin image. Black and white, with a cyan overtone. A woman's face is partially visible; you can see her eyes, nose, some hair, and the top of her right ear. She is on the left side of the image,looking to her right.
    A stylized image of Patrice Lumumba shown from the chest up. He is rendered in green and pink pastels. The background is deep red, and words are partially visible.

    The story of the assassination of Patrice Lumumba by the CIA, told through the lens of jazz. I’m sure glad our government hasn’t done anything shady since then.

    It took me a while to get into the rhythm of this- probably because it’s pretty frenetic and I’m running on about four hours of sleep- but even before I locked it I appreciated the look and sound used to make old newsreels, memos, and TV recordings work tell an eventually cohesive story.

    I’ve now seen 40 of the 50 2024 Oscar nominees. I’m mostly missing documentaries: two full length, and all five shorts. The other three are Maria (cinematography), Elton John: Never Too Late (song), and The Six Triple Eight (also song). I might get one or two in before the show tomorrow, but I’ll probably go for a bike ride instead.

    It’s weird to make silly posters for documentaries about serious subjects, but the energy of the film makes it feel a bit more comfortable. I think the only thing I really like about this poster is the title design. It’s not exactly the right base font to match the original, but it’s pretty darn close.

    A poster for Soundtrack of a Coup d'Etat that references the poster for The Sound of Music.
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  • Movie Pass Adventures: Universal Language

    A child dressed as Grouch Marx in Universal Language.
    Matthew from Universal Language on the phone, rendered in shades of gray and beige.

    The second half of my Unplanned Surreal Film Festival Weekend. Also my second film of the year in Farsi, but this one is much lighter than the last one.

    I didn’t remember anything I knew about this before I watched it, and I think that’s probably the best way to go into something as gloriously absurd as this. Without giving anything away, it feels a little like Wes Anderson directing Airplane (with second unit by David Lynch).

    For the fake poster, I did a riff on the title. It doesn’t quite have the images available to balance out the same way as the original.

    A poster for Universal Language sort-of matching the poster for Universal Soldier.
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  • Movie Pass Adventures: The Monkey

    A long, thin image taken from a scene in The Monkey. Theo James' face, covered in blood except for two rings around his eyes, is in the center. Most of the image is the curtains behind him, also covered with blood.

    I can’t imagine anyone wanting to live in Stephen King’s Maine. That place is scary… but it does give us some wacky movies. This is one of those movies that’s so violent and gory and goofy that it moves past horror and straight into cartoon. It’s not great, and it kind of fizzles at the end, but it’s a pretty fun ride. BONUS: features an Adam Scott cameo!

    The titular monkey from The Monkey, shown in three tones. Black with red highlights, with white teeth and eyes. His right arm is raised and his right hand holds a drumstick. The background is solid black.
    Turn the key and see what happens.

    This is my second simian-themed movie of the year. I thought about basing the parody poster on one for Better Man, but those are all pretty boring so I went a different way.

    A parody poster for The Monkey based on the original poster for Toy Story.
    I guess I also could have used the poster for The Tin Drum.
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  • Movie Pass Adventures: Companion

    A long thin image with the top half of Sophie Thatcher's face visible in the middle. The background is out of focus blue and black shapes.

    WARNING: One of the big twists in this movie is spoiled by the ad campaign, so my alternate poster below may also spoil that same twist. I think I’ll stick the featured image here to add some spoiler space (though I’m probably not going to spoil anything):

    Sophie Thatcher as Iris in Companion. She is rendered in pinks and purples. The background is out of focus reds, yellows, and greens.

    The good thing about this movie: spoiling one twist still leaves a bunch of fun ones unspoiled. The end is pretty predictable (especially given the voiceover at the start) but the ride to get there is a lot of fun.

    I struggle to find images and a poster that wouldn’t spoil anything. In the end I sort-of copied the poster for a film that doesn’t exactly give away the twist that Warner Bros decided to spoil, but it’s in the same ballpark.

    Poster for Companion (barely) parodying the poster for Robocop

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  • Academy Award Adventures: 2025 Live Action Shorts

    Last year I learned that there are special screenings of all the nominated short film categories. I went again this year, and… these didn’t do much for me, especially compared to last year’s nominees. Shorts should be the place where people make unexpected decisions, and these really don’t do that.

    Mastodon has stopped showing the front page featured image, so I’m sticking it here so it shows up:

    A collage of images from the 2025 Academy Awards Live Action Short Film nominees.

    The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent

    The Man Who Could Not Remain Silent movie bar

    There is a man in this movie who does not remain silent. The main character watches him and nervously smokes cigarettes. Look, I know short films by design are exercises in eliminating as many details as possible without breaking the story, but this cuts out important details and then gives them back in the synopsis. If your movie requires specific research to make sense, you’ve probably cut too much.

    Anuja

    Anuja movie bar

    I’m also aware that short films thrive on ambiguous endings, but this one ends like it’s the first episode of a TV series.

    I’m Not a Robot

    I'm Nt a Robot movie bar

    This movie also has an ambiguous ending, but it works. My favorite of the five; it won’t win. Note to self: go see Companion.

    A Lien

    A Lien movie bar

    This felt like the successor to last year’s Red, White and Blue; a serious and important subject told in a forced and melodramatic way. It’s the better of the two shorts, though.

    The Last Ranger

    The Last Ranger movie bar.

    Another important story told generically. You’ll know so much of the story ahead f time you’ll wonder if you’re clairvoyant.

    Since this is a collection of five unrelated shorts I didn’t make a parody poster, but I did throw together this:

    a stacked set of images from the 2025 Academy Awards Live Action Short Film nominees. Each one is a different color.
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  • Streaming Movie Adventures: Tangerine (2015)

    Sin-Dee, Chester, and Alexandra standing in front of Donut Time in Tangerine.

    This movie had a budget 500 times the size of the last one I saw: A hundred grand! A fortune!

    Sean Baker sure is good at making movies that jump into conflicting emotions without losing track of the story.

    I live less than ten miles from where this was shot. I’ve walked those exact blocks many times. I can’t tell you how many times I drove past the doughnut shop at the center of this movie and made a joke about it being Donut Time.

    Side note: RIP Donut Time. I believe I might have actually been inside once. I hope your current life as Danny Trejo’s doughnut shop is going well.

    Today’s poster parody felt like the obvious choice.

    A poster for Tangerine in the style of the poster for A Clockwork Orange.
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  • Movie Pass Adventures: Presence

    The main cast of Presence (plus a realtor).

    It’s hard to talk about this movie without giving away the different take it has on how to capture a ghost story, so I’m not going to try. Spoilers for that below. I won’t spoil any of the actual story, but if you want to be surprised by Soderbergh’s latest way of Soderberghing, now is the time to look away.

    All good? Cool.

    Soderbergh’s approach is to tell a ghost story from the point of view of the ghost. Every scene is a single shot from the ghost’s perspective. For the most part it works. The movie really only breaks when things happen that are beyond things that would happen in the real world; shaking tables are a lot more believable than floating objects.

    As for the actual story: It’s pretty predictable- especially since there are a couple of important plot points that were extremely telegraphed- but the cast is watchable enough to let that slide.

    Today’s fake poster is only the slightest of genre shifts. I could easily see a similar poster being actually used. This version, however, wouldn’t stand a ghost of a chance.

    A poster for Presence parodying the poster for Ghost.
    This movie had a shocking lack of pottery scenes.

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  • Movie Pass Adventures: One of Them Days

    SZA tries to get some shoes.

    Not every movie has to be The Brutalist. Sometimes the right movie is a low stakes comedy where crazy situations happen but you’re not worried because you know it’s going to work out for the right people; a movie where people repeatedly get into bad situations, and when they try to get out of them they fall into something worse until everything falls apart- which somehow is exactly what needs to happen to fix everything.

    Does this movie really make sense? No. Is it lighthearted fun with charming leads? Absolutely.

    And is it bad that it’s only February and I’m stretching to find reasonable posters to parody? Maybe.

    A parody poster for One of Them Days in the style of the poster for Dazed and Confused.
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  • Positively Ancient Movie Adventures: A Trip to the Moon (1901)

    A Trip to the Moon movie Bar

    A ton of film language hadn’t been invented in 1901, so this feel less like a movie and more like a vaudeville magic show with a tiny plot to tie the tricks together. The camera is always stationary. Scenes are single takes, and most new scenes have slow cross dissolves to give the viewer as much time as possible to figure out that they’re switching to a new place. But the creators aren’t afraid to try things. The sets are fantastical. Special effects are built out of hard cuts and multiple film layers. And there’s even social commentary about imperialism. Not bad for a movie that’s nearly 125 years old.

  • Movie (without a) Pass Adventures: The World According to Allee Willis

    Holy crap, Allee Willis did everything! If you don’t know who she is- I sure didn’t- this whole documentary is full of “wait- she also did THAT?” moments. You’ve heard the pop music she wrote (starting with Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September”). You’ve seen the art she created. You know the musical she did the music for. She was an early champion of Internet art and digital creativity for all. I can’t even estimate how much of the pop culture of my childhood originated in her brain.

    This documentary also has a huge advantage: Willis constantly documented what she was doing. Photos, audio, video, extensive notes; if there was a way to keep a record, she did it. It’s an unabashed celebration of her bonkers life, and it’s crazy fun.

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