If you haven’t, please check out my AFI Top 100 posts here.
One of the things that I wanted to be better about as we rolled into 2024 was how I spent money. I decided it might be wise to start putting more money into savings and retirement and all that fun stuff, so I had to make some changes. Mostly, I’ll just be trying to cut back on random Amazon purchases that I don’t need, and not buying every pair of shoes that I think look like they’d fit my style. One change I also made was cutting back on streaming services, which sounds insane to a lot of people, but do we really need more than one? I’ll probably rotate which one I’m paying for at a time, depending on what I feel like watching that month. Ok, now this is starting to sound like one of those articles where it talks about the 30 year olds who retire because they don’t have Netflix, and that’s not what I’m shooting for at all.
Really, this is just a long way of me announcing that I have absolutely no intention of stopping my Regal Unlimited subscription. Why stay at home and watch a stupid romantic comedy when I can go do the same thing at a movie theater with a bunch of strangers?
Anyway, here are all the movies I went to the movie theater for over the last month, and a bit about what I thought about them all:
Ferrari
I was really excited about this one. If you aren’t familiar, Ferrari is a movie about the life of Enzo Ferrari, well, a period of his life at least. It is directed by Michael Mann, who is a really interesting director who has my love because he made Heat, and that is just wonderful cinema.
Adam Driver plays Enzo Ferrari, and Penelope Cruz plays his wife, Laura. Both of them are wonderful in this movie, for all the flaws that it has. One of those flaws, in my opinion, is Ferrari’s mistress, Lina, played by Shailene Woodley. I’m not going to sit here and bash on Shailene Woodley, although that probably wouldn’t be a very difficult thing to do. She did her best, but she just seems horribly miscast in this role.
Overall, this certainly isn’t going to be a film I’m excited to watch again, but it was a pretty good theater movie, with all the car racing. There’s a crash in this movie that made me audibly gasp because it was so intense/surprising.
The Iron Claw
The late December/early January run of biopics that are a little darker in tone is always really hit or miss. While I wasn’t really the biggest fan of Ferrari, The Iron Claw is much more successful and entertaining from my perspective. This one follows the story of the Von Erich family, a pretty important story to the history of professional wrestling. If that turns you off because you aren’t into professional wrestling, I understand. Pro wrestling was never something I was allowed to watch as a kid, and it’s not something I ever pursued an interest in as I got older. This movie still blew me away.
Zac Effron, Jeremy Allen White, and LIly James all star as members of the Von Erich family, and while I previously mentioned the casting issues with Ferrari, this movie’s cast is absolutely perfect. Not knowing a single thing about the history of this family, or its place in wrestling was also a pretty big benefit, as it was truly edge of your seat shocking to watch this story play out. An amazing but heartbreaking film that I’d recommend.
Anyone But You
This was my palette cleanser. While the other two (new) movies that I saw this month were really dark and honestly kind of depressing, Anyone But You is fun, lighthearted, and maybe even kind of stupid. Basically this movie is just throwing a bunch of insanely hot people in an exotic location and letting them cook. It worked for me.
Anyone But You stars Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell, two human beings that look like they were crafted in a lab to be the conventionally attractive people in a romantic comedy. If you’ve ever seen a movie in your life you can predict exactly what happens in this one. In fact, let’s play romantic comedy Mad Libs, just to give you the setup:
Pretty woman (beautiful actress that is popular with Generation Z) has meet cute with a handsome male character (third lead in a Top Gun movie) in (insert location). The two characters spend a date together, but girl overhears boy telling his friend (something hurtful), so she leaves without talking to him again. Time goes by, but the two characters meet up again because (ridiculous scenario only found in movies with hot people). Since (previous ridiculous scenario) has gotten serious, there is a wedding in (beautiful location) where the two characters will be forced to spend time together. Time together helps the two finally communicate basic things that could have saved us all a lot of time, but (another ridiculous misunderstanding) causes the two to break up. When the handsome male realizes that he doesn’t want to be with his hot Australian ex, he realizes that pretty woman is the one he wants to be with until the movie ends, but before their horrible communication ultimately derails things again.
This might sound like I hated this movie, but the opposite is true. This was a joy, and I’m so glad there’s a movie like this in movie theaters and not just buried in the Netflix algorithm. 10/10, would watch again.
Special shout out to Dune, which I saw in a one night rerelease in IMAX with a special preview of Dune 2. Just warning you that my Dune nerd-out is coming soon.
What did I miss? Anything you are excited to check out? Let me know in the comments.