In an attempt to stick to our movie-related New Years resolutions, Jess and I plan to keep a weekly record of our progress towards our goal. See if we hit our goal this week and what movies we watched. You can also check out our initial resolutions post here.
My big goal this year is to watch three types of movies a week:
- 1 New Movie (anything that has come out in the last 3-4 months)
- 1 Movie From My Netflix Queue (it has to be from the list I cemented in stone at the beginning of 2014 to count)
- 1 Movie I’ve Been Meaning to Rewatch
Lets take a look at what was watched this past week.
New Movies:
- Me & Earl & The Dying Girl – Only caught one new movie over the past two weeks, but I expect to make up for that between Trainwreck and Ant-Man. This little Sundance hit was definitely a good movie with a lot of unique aspects and visuals. The movie-loving lead certainly played well to this audience. It’s so sad though, it would be hard to return and was just missing that spark to take it to the next level and make it a favorite.
Re-watched:
- Gone Girl & Nightcrawler – I rewatched two of my favorite films from last year. They both play very well on rewatch, even when you know what’s coming. Both are sad reminders that their leads were robbed of their Oscar win and/or nomination. I love how in both you have a character that seems like according to all your movie watching history will get their comeuppance… but they don’t.
Off the Queue:
- Touching the Void – Trying to knock some of the docs that have been on my queue forever. This movie was intense! It helped that there were really good reenactments of two men’s horrific mountain climbing ordeal. It was a great testament to human will, and even though the film felt long at the end, it might have just reinforced the grueling pain and physical exertion that the film’s subject had to endure.
New Movies:
- Me & Earl & The Dying Girl – Great cast and unique tone but ultimately had me feeling a little letdown. I’m not sure if it was the “hype” surrounding the project or my own left field expectations (I kept thinking that is would be this year’s Short Term 12) but I didn’t connect with the movie as much as I was hoping to.
- Southpaw – I enjoyed a lot of what director Antoine Fuqua and the main cast brought to the table but I wish there was less reliance on sports movie tropes. I felt like the movie could have been something great if it decided to side step a few of those little issues but overall I dug it. I’ll have a full review up of this at the end of next week.
Re-watched:
- Rain Man – Pretty damn fantastic movie. I haven’t seen this in quite a while but I love both Tom Cruise and especially (of course) Dustin Hoffman. I think this could have been a movie included in our recent collaborative list of Movies We Would Recommend to Anyone.
Off the Queue:
- In The Bedroom – It’s been two weeks of strong lead performances apparently. I hadn’t read anything about this movie since I put it on my to watch list back in the Stone Age which I felt very thankful for. A quiet drama that kept me emotionally invested from start to finish.
- The Squid and the Whale – Finally got up to seeing what all this Noah Baumbach love is about. This was a sweet & sour film that reminded me a lot of a Wes Anderson movie (which I found out after the fact that Anderson produced it so there’s that.) It was cute enough and I can see why it’s held in high regard but I would have liked a bit more comedy and tragedy in equal parts.