Hackneyed

  • Best Watches, 2025

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    Watched and re-watched quite a few movies this year. Like last year, I compiled a list that isn’t a “best of 2025,” but more a “best watched in 2025.” Still have a lot to go, but my favorites of 2025, thus far: One Battle After Another and Marty Supreme. Then maybe Superman? Other great movies…

  • Reiner

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    Before I was an MTV kid, I was a Nickelodeon kid. And like Cartoon Network turns into Adult Swim like a Pumpkin, Nick would become Nick at Nite. I loved Lucy, but I loved Archie Bunker. I knew he was always wrong. But I also new Meathead wasn’t always right. Years before Maron would argue…

  • 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century

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    Shared this list a few weeks ago on Substack: “Between streaming services and superhero blockbusters, the way we watch and think about movies has changed dramatically over the past 25 years. But through that period of upheaval, which films have truly stood the test of time? To find out, we embarked on an ambitious new…

  • Before Sunrise (2004)

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    Ended up watching The Before Trilogy in reverse order by accident, but I have to say, ending with Before Sunrise was unexpectedly beautiful. Seeing the places Jesse and Céline wander through in that first film, after knowing everything they will go through, gives those moments a haunting kind of weight. What was once romantic and…

  • Spike Lee’s Essential Cinema

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    Just over a decade ago, Lee posted this list of other people’s joints online. 400 Blows (François Truffaut) 8 1/2 (Federico Fellini) Ace in a Hole (Billy Wilder) American in Paris (Vincente Minnelli) Apocalypto (Mel Gibson) Bad Lieutenant (Abel Ferrara) Badlands (Terrence Malick) Battle of Algiers (Gillo Pontecorvo) Black Orpheus (Marcel Camus) Black Rain (Shōhei Imamura) Blue Collar (Paul Schrader) Bonnie and Clyde (Arthur Penn) Boyz n the Hood (John Singleton)…

  • What I’ve Been Doing/What I’ve Been Into

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    Up to: Into: Eat ’em up.

  • David Lynch is Gone

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    David Lynch, “maker of florid and unnerving films,” passed on the 15th at the age of 78. He was truly one of one. Peerless. “Like Frank Capra and Franz Kafka, two widely disparate 20th-century artists whose work Mr. Lynch much admired and might be said to have synthesized, his name became an adjective.” “He’s one…

  • Guerra de las Galaxias, Presentado por ¡Cerveza Cristal!

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    The original Star Wars trilogy didn’t air in Chile until 2003, and when it did, it had only one sponsor, a beer company that in lieu of traditional commercials, hilariously inserted scenes featuring their beers. This is something I think about often. Apologies for the poor Spanish in the title. (Via Kottke)

  • Best Watches, 2024

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    Compiled this list at Letterboxd, distilled down from 335. Not a “best of 2024,” more a “best watched in 2024.” Maybe I’ll do a proper list for 2024. If the Academy can wait til March, so can I. Thus far, I’d say Anora, Challengers, A Complete Unknown, A Real Pain and Snack Shack stood out…

  • Harold and Kumar is either the dumbest or greatest Thanksgiving/Christmas double feature.

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  • Jim Henson: Idea Man, Ron Howard

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    Had the pleasure to see the Muppets in a wonderful exhibit in Grand Rapids last year and this film served as an excellent reminder of that inspirational day. In his own words: “Life’s like a movie, write your own ending. Keep believing, keep pretending.” I will likely always be more of a George Carlin or…

  • Me and Rigby watching a Ghostbusters and Gremlins double-feature in honor of both movies coming out June 8, 1984.

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    Truly the day cinema peaked.

  • Recently Read

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    Two massive tomes I finally conquered: The Stand and The Pale King. Wouldn’t necessarily recommend either but I am glad I read both. Of course I love reading about movies. After making a list of my favorite (read: not the ones I think are the best) films, I realized two filmmakers had four films on…

  • American Movie, Chris Smith

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    Re-watched this wonderfully weird film last night and still love it as much as I did 25 years ago, but agree that it now hits different: “Today Mark Borchardt looks less like an amusing hustler, and more like a poetic and even tragic hero; the living embodiment of unfulfilled dreams. Even that scene with the unforgiving cabinet…

  • Hulu: Top 15

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    Since Hulu launched a “top 15” list of their most popular shows and films, I decided to counter with the fifteen things currently on Hulu I’d recommend. If you are stumbling on this list decades later and something is no longer on Hulu or Hulu is now just Disney+ or none of these words make…

  • Roger Ebert Passed 10 Years Ago Today.

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    Before the Internet, or at least any Internet I knew of, Siskel & Ebert was my best resource for what was coming out. By the time I hit the age where I wasn’t supposed to be seeing certain things but wanted to, those two were a gateway drug. Very few things sounded more interesting to…

  • Herzog’s Advice for Filmmakers

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    Apparently this list is on the back cover of A Guide for the Perplexed. Need to pick this up ASAP. (Via Kottke)

  • Round Midnight (1986)

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    I often want to live in films, but seldom ones this dour. But jazz clubs in the 50s, that’s my love language. Especially when it’s shot this beautifully, this dreamy. The faux-Paris streets at night are as out of this world as the soundtrack. Round Midnight unfolds so nonchalantly, there’s almost no exposition. Things just…

  • The Review(s) Are In.

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    Since debuting on the film festival circuit, we’ve had some positive feedback on Letterboxd and a nice local blurb when we hit the Bay Area (not to mention winning the audience award for Best Picture at a Film Fest in Saulte St. Marie). Also, not every day or even every decade I get referred to…

  • The Dinner Parting

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    I haven’t spoken much about this the last two years, but I am pleased to announce that The Dinner Parting, a movie I produced and co-wrote with my longtime collaborator J.W. Andrew, will make its debut at the Cinequest Film Festival. It will start virtually April 1st, and there will be an event in-person this…