New Year of Movie Nights
Christmas, DeLillo, stylish ultraviolence, and a cartoon
A couple of weeks since the last Movie Night recap, which spanned the New Year’s holiday. We did not end up watching all that many movies that weekend, though, because we opted to play games instead.
A Christmas Story:
I spent Thursday the 29th driving up to Lapland lake and cross-country skiing something like ten miles, so when The Pip asked to watch a movie, I was all over the opportunity to sit in a comfy chair and drink beer. He asked to re-watch the original A Christmas Story, having seen the sequel at my parents’ during the Christmas weekend. This is vastly better than the new one, mostly because the parents are just perfect.
White Noise:
The kids’ Christmas gifts included a couple new modules of the Dice Throne game that they really like and I do not, so I let them play that with Kate and retreated to the basement to watch a grown-up movie: The Netflix adaptation of Don DeLillo’s White Noise directed by Noah Baumbach and starring Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, and Don Cheadle.
I read the book when I was in Japan in 1998, and don’t remember it all that clearly (I remember the baseball game from Underworld much better); I mostly remember it being very odd and brand-obsessed. This does a very good job capturing that feelng. I’m not sure it’s entirely successful, but then the book wasn’t entirely successful for me, either. I am definitely happy that Netflix continues to give talented directors truckloads of cash to make weird shit, though.
John Wick:
We did the scroll-through-a-service thing, and this was one of the possibilities offered by HBO Max. The Pip agreed to it, and then halfway through the wi-fi crapped out for a bit, and I had to dig out the DVD.
Sometime in the last couple of days I retweeted somebody noting that “Very few movies manage to be exactly the thing they’re trying to be as well as Con Air does.” I think I’d put John Wick into that same category. The sequels get pretty baroque, but this just does stylish ultraviolence with incredible efficiency.
The Sea Beast:
The Pip wanted to watch the John Wick sequels, but we needed to hold off until SteelyKid is free to watch them with us, so we went in a completely different direction. I had listened to The Big Picture’s episode on animated movies of 2022, which made me kind of want to see either this or the Del Toro Pinocchio. The Pip went for this.
This is good fun, but still very much a kids’ movie, meaning that the direction of the plot is a little too obvious. The ending also feels weirdly rushed, particularly the “it’s all the fault of the royals” thing. But, you know, cool character design and some genuinely tense action scenes. I’ve watched much, much worse.
And that’s the last couple of weeks of media consumption in Chateau Steelypips. We’ve got a very busy week on tap around here, but I should be able to get some actual content out; if you want to see that, here’s a button:
And if you have Thoughts to share on any of these films, the comments will be open:
I liked the first John Wick movie quite a bit. As you say, stylized violence, done well. The sequels are pretty garbage, though.
You can argue that they're doing exactly the same thing as the first movie but I would disagree. The first movie had to establish characters (2D as they may be) and so the action was not entirely relentless. But, speaking of the action itself, movie 2 and 3 are unbearable in how repetitive the fight scenes are. How many times are goons going to advance (without cover) against John Wick's position only to have their gun blocked/immobilized and be gunned down without the ability to retaliate?
This is why, with modern guns especially, cover is essential and no one charges a defended position without at least constant covering fire (and ideally more in the form of body armor/shields/2 men team(s), more angles etc etc).
Is this a nitpick? I dunno. I am hardly a retired SAS so all of the above may be (is likely to be) gross over simplification. Yet goons/soldiers don't charge blindly into corners to get gunned down at point blank range. So yeah but no to John Wick 2 and 3. Ronin or Heat might be better options if you feel your kids can handle the more mature/realistic tone.