The Best Movie of the Summer (so far)
Plus: Am I OK?, The Watchers, and Bridgerton S3 reviews
HOUSE OF THE DRAGON SEASON 2 PREMIERE TONIGHT!!!! Catch up on my Season 1 Power Rankings. For now, though, we’re reviewing three movies I watched this past week. Or, scroll allllll the way down for more b*tching about Bridgerton.
Let’s start with some SHOUT-OUTS. Last week, I set a challenge of who could name an Olivia Colman movie with 4+ words in the title, a category that stumped me in the Cinematrix game.
Sagar and Ben delivered instantly with Murder on the Orient Express. Then Ryenn brought some real extra-credit energy with TWO options: 1) Puss in Boots: The Last Wish or 2) Hyde Park on Hudson.
Color me IMPRESSED, folks! I just sat there fixated on how great Colman is in Fleabag, but that is unfortunately not a film and not 4+ words.
Before we dive into the three movies I watched this week, let’s take a ramble into my internal beliefs about “How to enjoy movies.” Growing up, my family had a mantra going into the movie theater: “Low expectations!” [It sounds like we were not fun, but we were, in fact, very fun!] Expectations are everything. At work and in relationships, “manage expectations” is probably the most useful piece of advice I’ve ever given or received.
Keep your expectations low! It sounds cynical, but isn’t the flip side of the coin just saying: “Be open to being surprised!” “Be ready to change your mind!” “Don’t be inflexible!” “Be aware that many things in life will disappoint you, but also they might not!”
Low expectations = Great time!1
What’s your approach to movies? Do you adjust your expectations case by case? Do you always try to keep them low? Do you go in with expectations the size of the Burj Khalifa? We want to know!
Inside Out 2 — Best movie of the summer (so far)
Friends: Have you tried talking to a therapist?
Me: If by “therapist” you mean watching Inside Out and crying, then YES.
Inside Out is my favorite Pixar movie. Inside Out 2 is a deserving and wonderful sequel and easily the best movie of the summer yet. [We had high hopes for Hit Man and that was our mistake! See: “Manage Expectations,” above.] It didn’t pack quite the emotional punch as the first one [I mean, they can only kill Bing Bong once!], but by that I only mean that instead of weeping uncontrollably in the theater, I held down two big sobs and cried several discreet tears.
As a person with anxiety, this was such a perfect encapsulation of what it feels like, looks like, and what it does to your psyche. The talented and hard-working nepo-baby Maya Hawke was outstanding as the voice of Anxiety — she really carried the emotional weight of the movie in many ways.
I didn’t miss Bill Hader [replaced aptly as Fear by Tony Hale] or Mindy Kaling [replaced as Disgust by Liza Lapira]; and the new cast features not just Maya Hawke, but also Ayo Edebiri as Envy, Adèle Exarchopoulos as Ennui, and Paul Walter Hauser as Embarrassment. Gang’s all here!
As with the first one, this movie sweetly, gently, hilariously, and deftly taught me something about my own psyche and made me feel wholeheartedly hopeful about moving through the world. Lovely.
TLDR: Do your inner child a favor and watch this sweet film.
Am I OK? — Was okay.
Dakota Johnson is so boring in such a sexy way. Or, perhaps, Dakota Johnson is bland in a way that makes you wonder if you’re at fault for losing your taste buds. Or, Dakota Johnson is a beautiful, blank veneer hiding a mischievous imp beneath the surface. Or, Dakota Johnson is sort of like the photographic negative of the Manic Pixie Dreamgirl: A sexy, quirky woman with brown hair and good taste in art, but dry and sarcastic and deadpan and monotone and has never worn a color other than black or beige in her life.2
She usually annoys me, but here, her vibe generally works, though I didn’t always buy it. I laughed almost as many times as I rolled my eyes.
“Am I OK?” is about a woman in her 30s coming out as gay. It’s also a movie about late bloomers, identity, acceptance, and friendship. What I found most compelling was her embarrassment at not knowing herself, at having figured things out so late in life. It tapped into something universal: Feeling behind, feeling weird, feeling like you don’t belong and people will find out. Should I have kissed that person? Should I have said that thing? Why did I say that thing?
It’s a queer story centering a queer woman, and it doesn’t reduce her to a single thing. She is a PERSON, and her sexual orientation is a beautiful and important part of that.
Cons: 1) It feels like they’re faking their way through a lot of the lines [except Molly Gordon of The Bear, who I thought was hilarious]. 2) I wrote in my little movie notebook: “Everyone too skinny.”
TLDR: A so-so movie stronger on ideas than execution, but with moments of sparkle. I’d give it a 60%; nice for a weeknight or a Saturday morning.
The Watchers — A fairy tale pretending to be horror
This is getting godawful reviews, but I used my low-expectations trick and had a nice time. I walked out of the theater thinking, “I enjoyed that.”
The writer/director, Ishana Shyamalan [yes, THAT Shyamalan], is just 24 years old. Based on this project, I hope we can be excited about her trajectory. The hope is that she keeps developing her own voice and that the best moments of this film are due to her own skills and not just being carried by her dad’s.
It felt visually distinct. She knows her craft. The words “eerie,” “haunting,” and “lingering” all come to mind as I think about it. They’re beautiful words, and the movie was very beautiful if rather derivative and perhaps not fully thought through. We’ve heard these sounds before [Predator, much?], we’ve seen monsters like this before, and the narrative fabric is something we’ve probably heard/read/seen before.
To enjoy this, you really need to give yourself over to the idea of enjoying a fable. Which, kind of by definition, is a bit derivative of all that came before. I thought it was overall intellectually satisfying with enough of a spark of originality to carry me through.
TLDR: Visually strong but thematically both over- and under-stuffed. Overall, me and my low expectations enjoyed the ride.
Bridgerton Season 3, Part 2. Not to say, “I told you so,” but…
Who am I kidding, I love to say, “I told you so!”
Part 2 has borne out my warning: This ain’t good, y’all.
Bridgerton Season 3 is a show about marrying your high school sweetheart who was mean to you and never saw you for who you were and is kind of a beige carpet of a person — instead of marrying the mature, stable, generous [maybe gay?] man you met as an adult!
Ben and I could barely get through two episodes of Part 2, though Ben did ultimately conclude: “I love the Bridgerton approach to life: Whistledown in the morning, promenade in the afternoon, go to a ball in the evening: Whistledown, promenade, ball. Gym, tan, laundry.”
My friend Laura is going to be so mad at me for sharing this because she says I make her sound like a “demon critic” who hates everything, but she had the best summary of this season, AS ALWAYS:
“Honestly she and Colin deserve each other. She’s a little b**** and he’s a boy that is pretending to be a man and just wants to be married cuz he can’t figure out who he is outside of a relationship!”
Laura: Always putting her finger on the problem!
That’s it for this week, folks! Have any of you seen these movies? What are your thoughts? Will you be watching House of the Dragon? Did you like Bridgerton, and do I have it all wrong? Let’s hear about it!
I don’t always succeed because my natural state is to have the HIGHEST of expectations at all times. [A reason I was disappointed by Barbie, but let’s not reopen THAT can of worms.]
See my review of her movie Cha Cha Real Smooth.
Inside Out 2 high expectations UNLOCKED. 😂😬🥹
You’re spot-on with the Bridgerton take. The most annoying thing for me was that I don’t think Penelope took a deep breath or just chillaxed for the entirety of the season. Everything was wide-eyed, panicky, and breathless. Like girl, take a beat!