weekly digest: a not-so-little girl and a very big tower
everything that happened at Flick Filosopher from Monday, August 15th, to Sunday, August 21st
August is always a slow month for movies, but that blah movie vibe feels even worse this year, in our third late-summer doldrums of the pandemic. Confirmation that everything about film feels just plain off all around can perhaps be found in the news that multiplex chain Cineworld is considering filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the US. The UK company — which runs the Cineworld and Picturehouse chains in the UK and Regal Cinemas in the US, plus sites in Ireland, Eastern Europe, and Israel — is the second largest cinema company on the planet. This could be a signal of even rougher times for the industry to come.
Cineworld is blaming the lack of blockbuster releases recently for lower-than-projected attendance, and that may well be part of the company’s woes. I’m sure it’s a bit of a vicious cycle: people don’t feel safe going to crowded cinemas, so the studios don’t release many movies, so even fewer people turn up to buy a ticket, and so on. But absolutely nothing feels normal right now, and for me, at least, that sense of precariousness seems to only be getting worse, not better. Everything about our society has been thrown into upheaval, and none of us and none of our institutions have figured out how to make it settle down again, or what form the settling will take.
This isn’t just about movies, of course. I was just talking about this with my housemate and her visiting friend this morning, regarding office culture. We all agreed that almost no company will go back to 9-to-5, Monday-to-Friday at a cube farm. Some might try, except workers won’t stand for it anymore. Yet whatever shape the new normal will be is still very fuzzy.
I feel this acutely, personally, when it comes to my work. It seems like all structure to what film criticism is about and what it’s for has been thrown out, and whatever purpose it’s going to serve is still not in focus. It would be nice to think that I could help it find that focus… but it’s blurry to me at the moment, too.
I’m feeling very discombobulated, and it’s unnerving.
—MaryAnn
new at flick filosopher, Aug 15–21
new and ongoing cinema releases, US/Can, Aug 19
Killer-lion thriller Beast is new and exclusively in cinemas; horror prequel Orphan: First Kill debuts simultaneously in cinemas and on demand; more… [get the full rundown]
new and ongoing cinema releases, UK/Ire, Aug 19
Welsh folk horror The Feast and Hollywood horror prequel Orphan: First Kill and new and exclusively in cinemas; more… [get the full rundown]
new and ongoing dvd/blu/vod releases, US/Can, Aug 16–19
Horror thriller Orphan: First Kill is new on premium VOD and Paramount+; historical romantic drama Eiffel is on cable VOD; more… [get the full rundown]
new and ongoing dvd/blu/vod releases, UK/Ire, Aug 15–19
Animated flicks Minions: The Rise of Gru and Lightyear debut on premium VOD; the latest Liam Neeson action thriller Memory is new and exclusively on Prime; more… [get the full rundown]
Orphan: First Kill movie review: not-so-little girl lost [pictured]
The rare sequel better than the original, but that’s not saying much. Takes too long to get to its surprises, its adult star is unconvincing as a child, and its minimal cleverness feels like a cheat. [read the review | cinemas, premium VOD, Paramount+ US; cinemas UK]
Eiffel movie review: Gustave’s erection
Comfortably unchallenging French romantic drama, though it does Freudian-slip into implying that the engineer was only inspired to erect his soaring tower when an old flame reawakened his, er, heart. [read the review | cable VOD US; cinemas UK]
loaded question: what movie have you seen the most times in its initial theatrical run?
I think for me it must be 1993’s The Fugitive. I’m not even sure how many times I saw it, but it must be a dozen at least. [reply at Flick Filosopher | reply at Substack | reply at Patreon]
what I’m bingeing
Only Murders in the Building [Hulu US; Disney+ UK]: we are getting very close to finding out whodunnit, and I’m still not sure I can guess…
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law [Disney+ globally]: another not-bingeable one, at one episode per week; the debut episode was cute, but needs more lawyering…
Tweet of the week…
coming up at Flick Filosopher…
Idris Elba fights a lion in Beast
John Boyega in Breaking
Jordan Peele’s latest foray into horror, Nope
Korean airline thriller Emergency Declaration
Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis
oddball buddy dramedy Brian and Charles
period drama Mr. Malcolm’s List
Pixar’s Lightyear
horror Dashcam
Jurassic World Dominion
trips through multiverses with Everything Everywhere All at Once and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Oscar Best Picture CODA
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, for my sins
adventure comedy The Lost City
historical revenge drama The Northman
Moonfall
time-traveling ghost story Last Night in Soho
Kenneth Branagh’s autobiographical Belfast
based-on-a-videogame action-adventure Uncharted
And more!
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