weekly digest: Nicolas Cage as Nic(k) Cage is exactly what you think it will be...
everything that happened at Flick Filosopher from Monday, April 18th, to Sunday, April 24th
We’re into our third year of a pandemic that everyone is pretending is over. We may be in the early days of World War III. The catastrophic heatwave that is about to hit India and Pakistan* reminds us that we’re doing fuck-all about global warming. The cost of everything is spiraling out of control for ordinary people like you and me, but Elon Musk just bought Twitter for $43 billion, which leaves him with only $200 billion+ in his pockets.
I thought movies — and science fiction novels — had prepared me for living through the apocalypse, but all I wanna do is burrow under the covers and eat chocolate. And I fear it’s all going to get much, much worse before (if?) it gets any better.
How’s your week going? 🙄
—MaryAnn
*Kim Stanley Robinson’s brilliant 2020 novel The Ministry for the Future [Amazon US | Amazon UK | Apple Books US | Apple Books UK], about some of our near-term options for pushing back against climate change, opens with a profoundly harrowing chapter about a killer heatwave in India. Its horrors will inevitably come to pass soon. I cannot recommend this book — all his novels, really — highly enough: he always finds a path for the near future of humanity that balances hope with realism. His books always leave me feeling ever so slightly more optimistic. Maybe I’ll read his incredible trilogy about colonizing Mars again…
new at flick filosopher, Apr 18–24
new and ongoing cinema releases, US/Can, Apr 22
Historical action drama The Northman and animated heist comedy The Bad Guys are new and exclusively in cinemas; more… [get the full rundown]
new and ongoing cinema releases, UK/Ire, Apr 22
Action comedy The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent and French drama Happening are new and exclusively in cinemas… [get the full rundown]
new and ongoing dvd/blu/vod releases, US/Can, Apr 18–24
The Batman debuts on HBO Max and premium VOD; documentary Navalny is streaming on CNN+ (at least until the service shuts down on on April 30th); more… [get the full rundown]
new and ongoing dvd/blu/vod releases, UK/Ire, Apr 18–20
The Batman and The Nan Movie are new on premium VOD; more… [get the full rundown]
weekend watchlist: the unbearable wait for massive success
This is a taste of my Weekend Watchlist emails, which go out on Fridays to my paid Substack and Patreon supporters. [read more]
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent movie review: Cage, staged
Amusing but instantly forgettable, fueled by a self-congratulatory smugness and self-reference. The best bits are the sincere stuff: a scene-stealing Pedro Pascal and a sweetly vulnerable Nic(k) Cage. [read the review | cinemas US/UK]
loaded question: how much longer can the superhero paradigm dominate movies… and what’s next?
The teaser trailer for Thor: Love and Thunder landed today… and my response was, well, somewhat mixed. Where, when, and how does the current superhero cycle of cinema end? [reply at Flick Filosopher | reply at Substack | reply at Patreon]
what I’m bingeing
Call My Agent! Season 3 [Netflix globally except in Austria, Spain, Germany, and Portugal, for some reason]: didn’t get back to this in the past week
Picard Season 2 [Paramount+ US; Amazon Prime UK]: second week in a row this one feels like it’s treading water; quite disappointed…
Moon Knight [Disney+]: missed this week’s episode, might wait till the new one on Wednesday and have a mini binge
Bridgerton Season 2 [Netflix globally]: didn’t get back to this in the past week…
Old Enough! [Netflix US/UK/maybe other regions?]: continues to be incredibly cute…
Tweet of the week…
Truly we are living in the Bad Place…
coming up at Flick Filosopher…
Memory, this latest Liam Neeson action thingy
French abortion drama Happening
Downtown Abbey: A New Era, though I have no investment in the show
Oscar Best Picture CODA
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, for my sins
adventure comedy The Lost City
historical revenge drama The Northman
WWII drama Operation Mincemeat
Netflix’s Windfall
the Oscar-nominated short films
Deep Water, starring Ben Affleck and Ana de Armas
horror romance Fresh
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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