The Iron Claw

Year 17, Day 235 - 8/23/25 - Movie #5,119

BEFORE: Well, it's been another big week here at the Movie Year, with a lot of films set in the southern U.S., and from what I can tell, most everything was filmed in Louisiana - that Louisiana Film Board has been working HARD these last few years to give out those tax incentives to get more movies made there. I just read an article that said they filed new legislation in June to increase (or prolong, maybe) those tax incentives there, essentially making Louisiana the Hollywood of the South. 

Yep, "Hit Man", "Queen & Slim", "Nickel Boys", "Unhinged" and "Big George Foreman" were all filmed entirely or partially in Louisiana - but if you're like me, you could tell that just from the cast lists, with Gralen Bryant Banks and Tre Styles and Samantha Beaulieu turning up multiple times. The exception this week was "Hangman", which was filmed around Atlanta - tonight's film was set in Texas, but it was filmed around Baton Rouge. So yeah, it's mostly been a week for the Pelican State and the Big Easy. 

Michael Papajohn carries over from "Big George Foreman" for the last time (for now) and we go from a boxing film to a wrestling film. That works, right? 

THE PLOT: The true story of the Von Erich brothers, who made history in the intensely competitive world of professional wrestling in the early 1980's. 

AFTER: Most sports stories tend to be uplifting, or at least they try to be - like, who doesn't want to watch a movie about the winners? Whether it's a baseball movie, a football movie or a boxing movie, we're made to care about the athletes by getting a peek into their personal lives and then we want to see them win. Even "Nyad", none of us really felt that Diana Nyad had an engaging personality, she was honestly a bit rough around the edges, but didn't we all want to see her make it to Cuba, swimming unassisted? Though if she'd quit after being stung by jellyfish, I don't think we'd blame her for that. Sports favors the winners, but in most sports only 50% of the players can be winners on any given day, and that's the maximum. Only one driver can win an auto race and one horse can win a horse race, and then if you want to talk championships only one NFL team out of 32 can win the Super Bowl and only one MLB team out of 30 can win the World Series. So ultimately I think we can say there are more losers in sports than winners. 

Boxing and wrestling are sort of strange exceptions, like a lot of people have been boxing's Heavyweight World Champion over the years, and then when you factor in the other weight classes, maybe it's more people than you might think who can call themselves champions. And since wrestling is (at least partially) scripted - come on, you know it is - there are a lot of people who own championship belts in wrestling. I think everyone in the WWE has worn a championship belt at some point, even. Google is telling me that even Vince McMahon held the WWF title at some point, which sounds a very big conflict of interest if the league owner is somehow eligible to be the champion. But, we live in a world where the U.S. President is now somehow in charge of the D.C. police force and the Kennedy Center, and that's barely raised a stir after all the shite that's gone down in his first administration. (Me, I think the trouble all started back when Jeb Bush was in charge of the Florida elections, and his brother George W. was a candidate and we all just kind of let that happen.)

So the debate rages, is professional wrestling a sport? Well, college wrestling is a sport, and Olympic wrestling is a sport, but then when you get to the WWE and similar leagues, things tend to get a little fuzzier. I get that there are "faces" and "heels" and they develop these rivalries which are meant to keep the fans interested, honestly the storylines tend to resemble ongoing soap operas or even comic book battles at some point. Spider-Man has his set of villains, the Avengers have a different set, sometimes there's cross-over or the heroes team up or the villains team up, you know, you've got to keep it spicy. As for the moves, many of the more complicated ones require work being done on both sides, like the jumping off the top rope just doesn't work unless the recipient is within a certain distance to the ropes and also happens to be looking the other way. The multiple participants work out their moves in advance, so that alone calls the whole sport into question. It's a physical activity, and it's grueling work, but it simply can't be called a sport if the outcomes are pre-determined and the moves are rehearsed. Sorry. 

The way that the Von Erich family talks about their plan also gives us some insight - the father, Fritz, knows how things work and he has a plan for his boys, he wants one of them to bring a belt home, really he wants ALL of them to be world champion at some point, and he even knows what order it should happen in, for the maximum dramatic effect. What does THAT tell you?  He knows that if one of his sons fights the current champion, and it's a good, entertaining and well-viewed match, that puts his son in contention for the title. The same sort of thing happens with boxing, contenders getting title shots, only boxing isn't fixed. Err, not as much, anyway. But then this is a father who constantly ranks his own children and announces the order in which they are currently his favorites, and really, everything we know about parenting now tells us that's exactly not what any parent should do. You're supposed to love all your children equally, and if that's not possible, you're supposed to at least pretend that you do, otherwise one ends up being spoiled and the other ends up as a serial killer or something. Really, it's not rocket surgery. 

So if you want to think of this family of four wrestling sons as "cursed", I say that's B.S. There are hardships in every person's life, every single one of us at some point will have to deal with the death of a loved one, or an injury to ourselves, or at least come to terms with our own physical limitations. OK, maybe not the oldest brother, who died at the age of 5, but really he's a bit busy being dead so I'm back to my main point, everyone currently alive will have to deal with tragedy in the future, up to and including their own demise. That's not "cursed", that's the price we all pay for being alive. But people fall back on that word "cursed" after several tragedies in a row, because they have no other way to explain the proximity of those events. My grandmother always used to tell me that "people die in threes", but I noticed that when the fourth person died, she just started over, counting at "1". So it's all in how you look at it. 

I always think of the "Superman" curse - people look at what happened to Christopher Reeve, and also George Reeves, Margot Kidder, etc. and draw the conclusion that something about playing those characters had a role in them dying - or being in the "Poltergeist" movie, same deal. Well, Gene Hackman went on to live a bunch more years, and Dean Cain, who also played "Superman" seems to be in good health, so believing in "the curse" means discounting any information that doesn't support the theory, so therefore there is no curse. Look, everyone who was in "Gone With the Wind" is now dead, do we say there's a curse there? No, because the life expectancy of everyone and everything, over time, is zero. There's no bad luck, either, there's just accidents and in some cases systemic behavior that causes injury or eventual death. 

So I'd argue that instead of believing in a "curse" on the family, it might be worth pointing out that wrestling is a tough activity, even when the moves are rehearsed, so there's always a chance of fatal injury even when care is taken, or there's damage done to the body from repeated falls, head trauma, torn muscles and other minor injuries, also CTE and spinal damage that can accumulate over time. Also, shooting up with steroids for a lengthy period of time can also cause damage, and then it looks like some of the brothers were doing more recreational drugs, too. Then you factor in risky behavior like riding motorcycles, owning guns, etc. - I know, that's all the fun stuff down South - but in a family that's not only very competitive but dominated by a heavy-handed father figure who is incapable of expressing emotions in a positive way, it starts to look more like a recipe for disaster from the start, rather than a curse. 

Once the brothers sustain a few injuries (which, come on, kind of comes with the territory in wrestling) the family is really in a long downward spiral. It's not a happy journey for the audience, which is what's surprising in a sports movie, but maybe it shouldn't be? This is based on a real story about real people who got injured and couldn't handle it. There are other jobs besides pro wrestling, after all, but perhaps these brothers were so brainwashed by their father that this is the only way they believed there was to be, because that's what they were told. It was certainly the only path to win their father's love and/or respect, and that situation's at the root of the problem, it's really what did the most damage, if you ask me. 

There's a scene at the end with a lot of emotional impact, Kevin von Erich imagines his brothers getting together in the afterlife, there's a nod to Greek mythology as one crosses a river in a rowboat, similar to Charon's ferry across the river Styx. Sure, it's nice to imagine that there's an afterlife and we'll all be reunited with our deceased loved ones someday, but their oldest brother who died at age 5 is there, and he's still five years old!  So, that means if you die, you're THAT age in heaven for eternity, and like if you lost an arm or something, you don't get it restored in the afterlife, so, really, what's the point? I guess if you died in a fire you just walk around heaven all burned up and stuff. Really, this is somehow both not encouraging and also sort of proof to me that the whole afterlife thing's just more B.S.

Directed by Sean Durkin (director of "Martha March May Marlene" and producer of "The Rental")

Also starring Zac Efron (last seen in "That Awkward Moment"), Jeremy Allen White (last seen in "The Rental"), Harris Dickinson (last seen in "Where the Crawdads Sing"), Maura Tierney (last seen in "Twisters"), Stanley Simons, Holt McCallany (last seen in "Creepshow 2"), Lily James (last seen in "The Exception"), Michael J. Harney (last seen in "The Onion Movie"), Grady Wilson, Valentine Newcomer, Scott Innes (last heard in "Scooby-Doo"), Chavo Guerrero Jr.,Jullian Dulce Vida (last seen in "Rebel Moon - Part One: A Child of Fire"), Cazzey Louis Cereghino, Ryan Nemeth (last seen in "Pee-Wee's Big Holiday"), Kevin Anton, Brady Pierce, Silas Mason, Devin Imbraguglio, Kristina Kingston (last seen in "Jerry and Marge Go Large"), Jim Gleason (last seen in "Blue Bayou"), Maxwell Friedman, Aaron Dean Eisenberg, Leo Franich, Sam Franich, Chelsea Edmundson (last seen in "Army of the Dead"), Romeo Newcomer, Terry J. Nelson, J.T. Fletcher, Chad Governale, Robert K E Hughes (last seen in "Nickel Boys") with archive footage of Jimmy Carter (last seen in "Rather".

RATING: 5 out of 10 referees who never see the illegal moves for some reason

Big George Foreman

Year 17, Day 234 - 8/22/25 - Movie #5,118

BEFORE: Michael Papajohn carries over again from "Hangman" - I'm celebrating the work of a (I'm guessing here) under-appreciated character actor. He played a police officer in "Unhinged" and he's playing a similar role tonight. Really, if he's done his job well then you might not even notice him - but he had a small but pivotal role in yesterday's film which I don't even want to mention, because spoilers. But he'll be here tomorrow, too, playing an Olympic coach. So thanks to him for making this portion of my chain possible by playing so many diverse roles in different films. 

I'm losing a bunch more links to both horror AND romance films tonight, but those are the breaks. I only keep track of such things because next year I'll need to find ways to link to and from those sections, but I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it, I can't let that stop me from watching a film that the linking clearly wants me to work into the chain. 

THE PLOT: Fueled by an impoverished childhood, George Foreman channeled his anger into becoming an Olympic gold medalist and World Heavyweight Champion, followed by a near-death experience that took him from the boxing ring to the pulpit. 

AFTER: This one's been on the list for a while, a little over two years I guess, but since George Foreman died back in March there's been more of an impetus to get to it. Really, I think this is the first chance I had to link to it, but it links back to so many other films I watched this year, really, how can that be true? I guess because I would have needed both an intro link and an outro one, and several times over, this just wouldn't have taken me in the general direction I wanted to go in. OK, so I'll just stash it between two other films with Michael Papajohn and we can finally cross it off the watch list. 

It seems only fair, I watched how many movies about Muhammad Ali, both fictional and documentary, but it feels like we only need to devote one film and one slot to Mr. Foreman. Well, he wasn't the heavyweight champion for as long a period of time as Ali was, and I think Ali retook the championship belt three times, as opposed to Foreman's two. But George Foreman was the oldest person to ever become W.H.C., despite the fact that Ali was seven years older, all the times they fought. Yeah, that's how age works, once you're seven years older than someone else, you tend to stay that way. It's funny, because I would have thought that Foreman was older than Ali, just because Foreman didn't age as well, lost his hair and got that pot bellied dad bod, while Ali looked pretty youthful even when he was old, for the most part. Well, they say black don't crack. (But it does get fat, apparently.)

Foreman was always more serious, too, at least until he became a grandfather and cultivated a new, friendlier image as a commercial pitchman. That surly demeanor was never going to sell a lot of product on QVC, now, was it? Plus Ali was the louder, more upbeat one, and so naturally I thought he was younger. Au contraire. Ali was older, but probably in better shape overall. Plus he probably trained harder, here in this film we mostly see Foreman's training consist of punching the heavy bag, rather slowly at that. Well, what good is that going to do when his opponent is literally running circles around him? You can't hit what you can't catch. 

Of course, I already know so much about the "Rumble in the Jungle" fight with Ali that took place in Kinshasa, Zaire in October 1974, because I watched the whole documentary about it, "When We Were Kings". I know that the crowd was chanting, "Ali, kill him!" and that this was where Ali employed the "rope-a-dope" strategy of leaning on the boxing ring ropes, allowing Foreman to get so close that his punches would be ineffective, except for the fact that George would throw so many that he tired himself out. Hey, if that's how you're comfortable winning a boxing match, more power to you, but can you really call yourself "The Greatest" after employing this tactic?

The George Foreman Lean Mean Grilling Machine is not given enough screen time here, really I was hoping that the whole third (or fourth) act of the film was going to be all about Foreman's time as a pitchman for that kitchen grill. I think this was an angle on George that should have been explored in more detail, they teased it in the beginning of the film when he and his brothers and sisters had to all share one hamburger because they were so poor. Why not show his life as a griller in more detail, since it was set up so beautifully at the start?  I mean, clearly this is a man who loved food, especially grilled meats and pressed sandwiches, we do get to see him bragging about his special recipe for BBQ sauce at one point, but that's it?  We should see him constantly grilling, after he has finally has enough money to buy all the hamburgers he wants and doesn't have to share them with anyone, unless he wants to. The bank manager sort of mentions the income from his grill business as something of an aside, like "Oh, yeah, also the check from the royalties on your little grill side hustle came in, you could be on to something..." Wait, that's IT? 

Really we needed a deep dive into how this little grill could possibly both seal in the meaty juices AND simultaneously "knock out" the fat. Wait, is that even possible, and if so, HOW?  Aren't the juices the fats, and aren't the fats the flavor?  Look, I owned one of his grills, maybe two over the years, and I loved them. I want a whole movie about this grill and the mechanics of the drip-tray, and the effect it had on the eating habits of millions of Americans. What were the total sales of this grill? Why did they change the design after a few years? Besides grilling meats and making pressed sandwiches, what else was it capable of doing?  This film makes it sound like Foreman just licensed his name for the product to another company and had no dealings with the research, the design, the marketing strategy and such. Come on, he was the FACE of indoor grilling for years, people stopped having to go outside during rain and snow to grill their meats, that's HUGE!  You're going to tell me that he was completely hands-off when it came to the grill business, and he just cashed the check? No, that's too horrible, I refuse to believe it. I prefer to think he was doing "research" every damn day to make that grill the ultimate example of how to put a mini-BBQ grill RIGHT on everyone's counter-top. 

You probably think I'm joking, but what if I told you that George Foreman made MORE money from endorsing that grill than he did in his entire career as a boxer?  It's true, he got $138 million for the name rights and he earned 40% of the profits from each grill - I know enough "Shark Tank" to understand the power of royalties, he earned $200 million lifetime from this grill. See, even if you can't perform at your job any more, there's always the chance of getting into another, more lucrative career. That's the American way, just don't call it a comeback. 

Directed by George Tillman Jr. (director of "Faster" and "The Hate U Give")

Also starring Khris Davis (last seen in "Space Jam: A New Legacy"), Jasmine Mathews (last seen in "The Man from Toronto"), Sullivan Jones, Lawrence Gilliard Jr. (last seen in "Walk of Shame"), John Magaro (last seen in "Overlord"), Sam Trammell (last seen in "The Fault in Our Stars"), Sonja Sohn (last seen in "Shaft" (2000)), Forest Whitaker (last seen in "Havoc" (2025)), Shein Mompremier, Robert Cicchini (last seen in "The Watcher"), Matthew Glave (last seen in "The Way Back"), Erica Tazel (last seen in "House of D"), Dwayne Barnes (last seen in "Blankman"), Deion Smith, K Steele (last seen in "We Have a Ghost"), Austin David Jones, Jordan Yarbrough, Philip Fornah (last seen in "Between Worlds"), Al Sapienza (last seen in "Cellular"), Brian Ibsen, Kei Rawlins, Judd Lormand (last seen in "Snitch"), Don Tieri, Robert Larriviere (last seen in "The Lovebirds"), T.C. Matherne (ditto), Matthew Rimmer (ditto), Ayden Gavin, Azaria Carter, Tom Virtue (last seen in "To Leslie"), Anthony Marble (last seen in "Nickel Boys"), Billy Slaughter (ditto), Bill Martin Williams (ditto), Isaiah A. Evans (ditto), Jordan Bates, Dinetia Dean, Russell Mora (last seen in "Creed III"), Deneen Tyler (last seen in "Runaway Jury"), Lara Grice (ditto), Madison Dirks (last seen in "The Dilemma"), April Dupré, Nile Memmezzwattay, Julia Lashae (last seen in "Love Liza"), Ray King Sr., Slim Danger Barkowska, Greg Wattkis, Samantha Beaulieu (last seen in "Unhinged"), Eric Hanson, Kenneth Martin Jr., Selase Botchway, Makario Glenn, Tre Styles (last seen in "Hit Man"), Chukwuma Onwuchekwa, Keith Hughes, Michael Harrity (last seen in "Judas and the Black Messiah"), Chance C. Morris, Desiree Edwards, Jimbo Stevenson, Raion Hill, Jose Reinaldo Flora, Tommy Wright (last seen in "Fruitvale Station"), Cedric Boswell, Charles Brewer Jr., DJ Walton (last seen in "Creed II"), David Jite, Carlos Takam, Barry Hanley, Zephaniah Terry, Phillip Craddock, Matt Frost, Bob Pelletier, Michael Ricca, David Proctor Jr., Joshua Wade, Mark Baggs, Renaldo Brady, Elisha Davis, Jeffrey Klemmer (last seen in "Affairs of State") 

RATING: 6 out of 10 exhibition matches

Hangman

Year 17, Day 233 - 8/21/25 - Movie #5,117

BEFORE: I've kind of hit that part of the year where it's not really about what I want to watch, it's more about watching whatever's going to get me to the next movie that I really want to watch, and that's at least a week away. So yeah, I'll admit it, the linking is kind of driving the bus right now, but if I hit a good movie or two, something that I wasn't really planning to watch but is still moderately enjoyable, I'll take that as a win. Is tonight's film a good movie? A bad movie? Who knows, that should be part of the fun, right?  

I've got job interview #2 today, by web meeting, and do I really want to work in a sports stadium, doing some form of concessions? No, not really but I do maybe need to get some concessions experience on my resume if I want to manage a commercial theater someday. That really wasn't a career goal of mine until I got back into working in movie theaters when they all re-opened after the pandemic. I worked at an AMC in the summer of 2021 and I avoided their attempts to teach me how to run concessions, partly because I didn't plan on being there long, and partly because it looked like a lot of work and I was pretty busy sweeping floors and taking out the trash. Then I moved to my current theater job, where there's no concession stand, but people can bring in food from outside if they want. I skated once again, but now I'm kind of paying the price because I wasn't hired at the last cinema I applied to, probably for this reason, I haven't worked selling food since 1988 or so. So I might have to take a crappy stadium concession job for a while just to get some experience in this skill, but if something better comes along in the next month, I'll weasel out of it yet again. If I'm offered this, I'll take it as a temporary safety job - that's a thing, right? 

Michael Papajohn carries over from "Unhinged". 

THE PLOT: A homicide detective brings his partner out of retirement to help catch a serial killer whose crimes are based on the children's game Hangman. 

AFTER: I enjoy puzzles, and I read a monthly puzzle magazine called Games World of Puzzles (it used to be two magazines, one was called Games and one was World of Puzzles, but they merged). I've read this mag since its first issue, which my grandfather handed to me back in like 1977, it usually has everything from crosswords to cryptograms, from word searches to acrostics, and everything in between. Articles and reviews on puzzles, and a monthly contest. (Let me remind you that this blog does NOT accept advertising of any kind, paid or unpaid, so if I say I like something, it's only because I truly like it.). Up until last month, the magazine usually featured a 2-page puzzle called "Solitaire Hangman" - they know that people don't generally solve puzzles in groups, we puzzle nerds are more the loner types, so they re-designed the game of Hangman for individual play. You're given blank spaces for the letters, and when you guess a letter, you match the letter with the number of the word and then it tells you in a chart on the next page whether that letter appears in the word you're working on. But if you guess a letter that's not in the word, you're supposed to draw a piece of the stick figure body hanging from the noose, like in the classic children's game. 

It seems that "woke" culture has invaded my favorite puzzle magazine, because in the June issue they re-designed the game as "Boxing Match", now if you guess a wrong letter you're just supposed to put an X in one of six boxes, no more drawing the stick figure who's being executed by hanging, apparently this was too triggering for a small percentage of readers. COME ON! Ok, maybe it's not an appropriate jumping-off point for a kids game, but we're all adult readers and puzzle solvers, can some of us not handle a little stick figure execution once a month? I usually skip this puzzle, but I'm still offended that some Karen (or male Karen) out there probably wrote in and complained, threatened to cancel their subscription to a PUZZLE MAGAZINE unless they removed all implied references to public executions (or solo suicide, honestly we don't really know). Look, maybe the stick figure was a very evil little imaginary drawn guy, maybe he killed 27 other stick figure guys and he deserves capital punishment, OK? Don't draw me into your little snowflake aversion to seeing a stick figure choking to death, anyway YOU can save him, just pick the right letters, OK? Is this really where we find ourselves, where people are more concerned about having to DRAW an imaginary stick figure being hung in a noose than they are about saving the lives of, say, immigrants or homeless people or starving people in another country? THIS is what bothers you? Well I'm not playing "Boxing Match" or whatever this game is supposed to be called now. But maybe focus your hang-ups on what letter games they might be playing in your own kid's school, and leave my puzzle magazine the hell alone. What's next on the cancel culture playlist, "Battleship", "Minesweeper" or the card game "War"?  If you come for my cryptic crosswords, I'm going to get really angry, and you won't like me when I'm really angry. 

Anyway, there's this film called "Hangman" that also riffs off that classic kids game - but this movie is for adults, because there's a serial killer outside Atlanta, Georgia who's leaving behind a body every 24 hours, with a letter carved into its torso. And there are 10 letters on the Hangman board, so the detectives are expecting that many bodies to turn up. Well, it's going to be a busy week, that's for sure. Well, great, I thought, here's a puzzle and every so often we get another letter, really this is more "Wheel of Fortune" than "Hangman" (see below for more on this) and how many times do I catch the end of "Wheel of Fortune" and I can solve the puzzle, but the dopes playing the game on TV can't? It's like, almost every time, so maybe I should give up on "Jeopardy!" and try out for the easier stuff. 

Detective Will Ruiney (pronounced "Rooney", but I assume the spelling is important, he's a ruined man, get it?) is the first (OK, second) on the scene when the first (OK, second) body is found, and wouldn't you know it, it's the day when he's being shadowed by a reporter who wants to do a ride-along. Isn't that always the way? The first victim is a teacher hanged outside her school, with an "O" carved in her body. Which is a bit odd, they somehow all know it's an "O" and not a circle, which you'd think might be the first guess. Inside her classroom are two mannequins staged at desks facing the board, as if they're playing Hangman, and carved into the teacher's desk are Ruiney's badge number and the badge number of his old partner, who is retired, but is brought back in to consult on the case. 

The autopsy of the teacher reveals information that leads the detectives (with reporter in tow) to the victim's girlfriend, who's brought in for questioning but tries to commit suicide after the interrogation. OK, well, I guess she's eliminated as a suspect, for now. Further analysis of blood found in the teacher's bedroom leads them to a man who works at a church, and there they find another victim, with another carved letter. That victim is wearing a pig's head, which leads them to a slaughterhouse, and... well, you can probably already see the pattern. They keep finding and analyzing clues, only to arrive at the next scene just a bit too late, but hey, they get another letter, so eventually that's going to form a word, and then we'll have something, right? Umm, yeah, about that, don't get your hopes up. Damn I love puzzles and I was really trying to figure out what the word was going to be, it's somehow impossible AND a letdown at the same time. 

What's kind of odd about the pattern is that they KNOW all the killings take place at 11 pm. Why, then, once they figure out the pattern, do the three crime-solvers seem to re-convene at 10 pm every night, this way by the time they figure out where the next hanging is going to be, they haven't left themselves enough time to get there and stop it?  Look, I know they need to sleep, we all do, but there are 24 damn hours in a day, if they hit the sack at, say midnight, they can get up at 8 am, have some coffee, a bite to eat, then they've still got like 15 hours to figure out who the next victim is, and then find that person before the noose goes around their neck?  OK, maybe these detectives are on the night shift, but even so, let's put in a little overtime here, crime never sleeps, right?  Maybe they're working behind the scenes, but the film really only cuts to them the next night, and they don't seem to be working to beat the deadline. It's about time management, guys, the faster you solve this crime the sooner we can all get on with our lives. 

Of course, the killer starts to pick victims that are in the orbits of these two detectives, this was personal right from the start. And OF COURSE the life of the reporter is going to be at stake at some point, that's why you have a young pretty character like her in the story in the first place. Halfway through the film, these detectives finally get the bright idea to go through their thousands of cases over the years and try to filter out who from their past might be on the revenge track. This is pretty standard and really, it's fine, I'm just glad it didn't turn out to be one of the two lead detectives behind all the murders. I've just seen that sort of thing too much over the years, it's been played out. 

Now, my main beef, my NITPICK POINT over the use of the "Hangman" game in these murders. It just doesn't really work, in the sense that the children's game isn't really reflected here in the correct way. In the traditional game, guessing a wrong letter is bad, it means that one more piece of the hanging man gets drawn, but if a player can guess the right letters in time, the man is spared from the noose, as he's not completely drawn. I know, it's all a stretch, but work with me here. The guy gets hanged after too many WRONG guesses - but there's no guessing of letters here at all, the letters are revealed in the bodies of the victims, and they're the CORRECT letters of the word being formed, so that's all backwards, isn't it? Well, I guess you can cover it by saying that a serial killer can't be expected to think about the logical rules of a game, and he's by definition doing a very illogical thing by killing people, but this is not a true game of "Hangman" because it doesn't follow any of the rules or gameplay properly. Maybe there was no way to do that, but then, if so, PICK ANOTHER GAME. 

Also, Detective Archer is, like me, a puzzle guy, we see him doing crosswords throughout the film. It's a bit weird that he never ONCE tries to figure out what the secret word might be, if he's a crossword solver you'd think that would be the first thing he'd try, to gain some insight. 

Also, I'm betting that Monroe, Georgia might actually be a pretty nice place to live, and there's probably more murders in this film than that nice little town has seen in, let's say, a decade. Sure enough, Google has informed me that Monroe is "generally a safe and pleasant place to live." I mean, nowhere is the murder rate ZERO, but there it's probably less than what is depicted here. Now, why would a town let someone film a movie like THIS there, which suggests that there's at least one serial killer in the area? 

Directed by Johnny Martin (assistant director of "Drive Angry")

Also starring Al Pacino (last seen in "Outstanding: A Comedy Revolution"), Karl Urban (last heard in "The Sea Beast"), Brittany Snow (last seen in "X"), Joe Anderson (last seen in "Hercules" (2014)), Sarah Shahi (last seen in "I Don't Know How She Does It"), Sloane Warren (last seen in "Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret."), Chelle Ramos (last seen in "The Leisure Seeker"), Steve Coulter (last seen in "We Have a Ghost"), Michael Rose (last seen in "Ride Along 2"), Katelyn Farrugia, Edgar Zanabria (last seen in "The Suicide Squad"), Matt Mercurio (last seen in "Lady and the Tramp"), Dwayne Boyd (last seen in "Allegiant"), Scott Parks, Jermaine Rivers (last seen in "Black Adam"), Garrick Parks, Odessa Rae (last seen in "Movie 43"), Cecil M. Henry, Viviana Chavez (last seen in "Baby Driver"), Edward Martin Jr., Stephanie Enderby, Shirley Martin,

RATING: 4 out of 10 mausoleum plaques

Unhinged

Year 17, Day 232 - 8/20/25 - Movie #5,116

BEFORE: Lucy Faust carries over from "Nickel Boys". So far it's been Louisiana week here at the Movie Year, this is the fourth film in a row either set there or filmed there (or both). And I'm willing to bet that has something to do with the casting, why I've seen some of the same actors a few times this week - or perhaps it's got something to do with tax incentives for filming there, who knows. 

By chance I've programmed this film for August 20, and that's REALLY close to the anniversary of its release date, five years ago. This was one of the first, or perhaps even the first, major release since the theaters closed down in March 2020. Drive-in theaters opened that summer, and Hollywood was still testing the waters for re-opening, starting with this film. Well, that's not a good sign because it seems like they knew they had a stinker of a film on the shelf and were willing to use that as a test case - if it tanked, no big deal, just try again in a month or so. 

It's also available right now on iTunes (yes, some people still use Apple iTunes) as a rental for only 99 cents. While I like saving money just as much as the next guy, that's probably not a good sign either. If you look at the price of, say, comic books, most are priced at $3.99 these days, but the ones they KNOW are going to sell better (and all #1 issues) are priced at $4.99. So I'm guessing when nobody rents a particular movie via iTunes, they just keep lowering the price. 

Speaking of that, I've had good luck lately with an app called TooGoodToGo that lets me buy food from NYC restaurants near closing time - the goal is to rescue food that otherwise might be thrown away and reduce waste (while increasing MY waist...). I didn't have much luck with the app before, but then I tried it on weeknights and learned there are like three pizza places near the theater that sell off remaining food, I just have to order it through the app. One has a steam table and lets me fill up a one-pound container with whatever food they have left for just $4.99, it's a great deal, and the restaurant gets to make a couple more bucks before they close, so it's a win-win. 

THE PLOT: After a confrontation with an unstable man at an intersection, a woman becomes the target of his rage. 

AFTER: Wow, what a terrible premise for a film, it's hard to believe that this got made at all, with a focus on such a completely unlikeable, terribly flawed character. I mean, he's almost Shakespearean in this flawed nature, like MacBeth or Hamlet or something, he just can't stop killing people. I know, Hamlet's not really a psycho-killer but he does kill Polonius almost by accident, and convinces Ophelia to go drown herself - and those were without even trying. Then he sets out to murder his own mother and stepfather, the King and Queen!  That's it, Hamlet, keep reaching toward your goals. (New angle on the Hamlet story - Hamlet as psychopath...like "American Psycho" only set in medieval Denmark.)

But Russell Crowe's character here goes WAY off the deep end, the first thing we see in the film is him killing his ex-wife and her boyfriend, then setting her house on fire. Hey, divorce is never easy. Then later the film mentions that this man also lost his job prior to this, he got laid off just shy of qualifying for his full pension. Now THAT might be enough to turn some people into murdering murderers. Throw in "road rage" on top of that, and it's like a full buffet of unfettered freeway hostility. 

The problem starts when Rachel Flynn oversleeps, and has to drive her son to school - he's most likely going to be late, and his third tardy mark gets him a detention. Now, I don't know much about driving kids to school since I don't have any, but when we're in North Carolina I know that my sister has to devote like three or four hours of her day just to driving the twins to school AND then waiting in a line of cars to pick them up. Well, jeez, you might as well just drive them to school and go RIGHT into the pick-up line at that point, because your whole day is shot anyway. Silly me, I said, "Why can't they just take the bus?" The bus works on some kind of centralized system where everyone is bussed to a hub and then has to take another bus out from the hub to the school, which sounds a lot dumber than the multi-bus system in my hometown that made stops at many points around town, and kids just had to go wait at whichever stop was nearest their house. But when I was growing up, we only got a car ride from Mom or Dad when we MISSED the bus. These days I can see how it makes more sense to drive your kid to school, except that it doesn't make sense at all - there's too much traffic because every other parent is also driving their kid to school because the bus system is so stupid. So it looks like no matter what, it's going to take three hours to get your kid to school, so be prepared to make them leave the house at 5 am, and if THAT'S the case, they might as well walk. If everyone walked to school, that would...no wait, that might actually work, except the kids would never go for it, they're spoiled rotten by now, that would eat into their phone time and also it's not safe - they could get hit by a car or a bus. 

The second mistake Rachel makes is taking the freeway - which was designed to be faster than local streets, only it's not because everyone else is also taking it to save time, so everyone gets stuck in traffic on that very same freeway. You SHOULD take surface streets if you want to get where you're going while everyone is taking the freeway to save time. The GPS systems don't help at all, because they direct everyone to the time-saving freeway where they all get jammed up together. More recently we've seen interactive GPS systems like Wave that tell you to change your route when there's another method that will save you 5 minutes, but guess what, the system is telling that to all the OTHER drivers, too, so if you listen to the GPS advice and change your route, that's probably a mistake because the new route is about to get filled up with other cars, and you'll get stuck in traffic there, also. I think you're better off if you reject the new route, stick with the original plan, and let all the other cars get out of your way. I know it doesn't seem to make sense, but just try it, and you're welcome. Or why don't you just abandon the car and walk, you could probably use the exercise. 

I go through something similar with the NYC subway - if I'm trying to get home on the L line and there's some kind of problem (and there often is) there will be an announcement over the PA system that since the L line is not currently working, I can go upstairs and take the A train to Brooklyn, where I can transfer to the G train, which will then take me to the L train. Well, by the time I make three transfers I will have spent an extra hour trying to get home OR I can just stay in one place and wait to see if they can get the L train running again in the next 20 minutes. It may seem counter-productive, sure, but everyone's in such a rush all the time, I say just stop, stay where you are, and see if the system will get better on its own. And if it doesn't, you can always just scrap your old life and start a new one in your current location. 

Great, now where were w?. Ah, yes, road rage. Rachel's third mistake is getting behind a pick-up truck that does NOT move forward when the light turns green - he takes so long to go through the intersection that the light turns red again, and she feels the need to break the law and run through the red, because she's been waiting there so long that she EARNED it. Well, that's not how traffic works, is it? You miss the green, you can't leave the scene, you've got to wait for the next one. She also REALLY leans on the horn, without the "courtesy tap", you know, a friendly little "bee-beep" instead of a long, loud HHOOOONNNNNNKKKKK. Point of order, you never know what kind of day the person in the car ahead of you has been having, maybe they just killed their ex and burned their house down and they're starting to maybe feel a little guilty about that, but instead of them coming to the awful realization about what they've done, suddenly they're now outwardly projecting all that inner rage and doubt and grief and sadness and evil intent AT YOU. Hey, it could happen. 

So Tom Cooper, the personification of road rage, pulls up beside Rachel at the next light - see, there's another lesson right there, if you go around someone who's ahead of you, cut them off and move forward, you're only going to end up stuck next to them 1/8 of a mile down the road. That's something important to keep in mind when you're frustrated about your lack of progress, it's usually NOT the fault of the person ahead of you, it's the fault of all the other drivers on the same road, too. There's just too damn many people in this world, there's traffic. everywhere. you. go. Sorry if that's a little too REAL for you, but if you want to get somewhere, that's on YOU because you didn't leave early enough. 

I think Tom Cooper (if that is his real name) gets it, he agrees that there are too many people in this world, and he wants to do something about that. So he steals Rachel's phone and decides to start killing the people in her contact list until she apologizes and means it. Well, maybe this would cut down on the traffic eventually, but it's still not a recommended way of going about things. First he decides to attend her breakfast appointment with her divorce lawyer, and this too is kind of Shakespearean, remember that quote from Henry IV, "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers."  We know, however, that this line was taken out of context, and good old Billy Shakes didn't mean to advocate violence against legal professionals, this was intended as a satiricial criticism of bureaucracy and how lawyers helped to maintain the privileges enjoyed by the wealthy class, and that such an extreme measure, taken at face value, could bring society to the brink of absolute intolerance, and also, wouldn't that be a real hoot. Tom Cooper takes it literally, though, because he's also a divorced person who feels they got screwed over by an attorney at some point. 

From then on in the movie, it's one car chase after another, as Tom makes Rachel go and pick up her son from school, because he really really wants Rachel to feel the pain of losing the people who are the most important to her.  Also he makes her choose the next victim from her contact list, but ha ha, Rachel's getting smarter because after she names the client who recently fired her, she also calls the police to tell them where the psycho who's stalking her is going to go next. But not really, because remember he's still both smarter AND meaner than she is, so he says he's going to one place, but he's really heading to her home address to kill whoever is there.  Well, he likes to keep people guessing, I suppose that's what a psychopath has to do to keep the joy of murder fresh.  

Really, we're just going to keep bouncing from one murder site to the next until we fill up 90 minutes, aren't we? Finally Rachel gets the idea to go to her mother's house, which will get Tom lost in a maze of suburban streets, and where they can set off her LifeAlert panic button to get the cops to show up. I was going to cite a NITPICK POINT about her leaving her red station wagon out where it was very visible, like why tip him off which house you're in? Ah, but it's all part of Rachel's attack plan, she's kind of pulling a "Home Alone" move here. Yeah, that should do it but, you know, bring along some golf clubs and sharp objects just in case. Rachel learns a valuable lesson about loud honking, which kind of seems like blaming the victim, if you ask me. 

Directed by Derrick Borte 

Also starring Russell Crowe (last seen in "Gladiator II"), Caren Pistorius (last seen in "Gloria Bell"), Gabriel Bateman, Jimmi Simpson (last seen in "Fool's Paradise"), Austin P. McKenzie, Juliene Joyner, Stephen Louis Grush, Anne Leighton (last seen in "Gangster Squad"), Devyn A. Tyler (last seen in "Shock and Awe"), Samantha Beaulieu (last seen in "The Whole Truth"), Michael Papajohn (last seen in "Madame Web"), Richie Burden, Deven MacNair, Gretchen Koerner (last seen in "Irresistible"), Donna Duplantier (last seen in "Hit Man"), Brett Smrz, Andrew Morgado (last heard in "The Christmas Chronicles: Part Two"), Kevin Howard, Mandy Kowalski.

RATING: 3 out of 10 ineffective police officers

Nickel Boys

Year 17, Day 231 - 8/19/25 - Movie #5,115

BEFORE: Gralen Bryant Banks carries over again from "Queen & Slim", and he'll be back in October for a double-feature of horror movies. Seriously, this guy gets around, it's kind of like once you notice a character actor, you're going to start seeing him everywhere - because he's everywhere. 

This was originally going to be my last film in August, before I flipped around a part of the chain, because this seemed to offer a lot of linking opportunities, it almost seems a shame to treat it like just an ordinary film, maybe I needed to save it to get me out of a linking jam next year or something. But now I realize that most of those links would connect to either horror films or romance films, and I'm not in that mode right now. And the horror chain is set now, I don't need the assistance, even those two films with Mr. Banks in them are square in the middle of that block, so I need to focus on the links to the start of the block and also the end. But yeah, I'm aware of the 99% of the links that I don't use, as each day I really only need one. 

I remember there was a big push last year to get Academy members to see this film and consider it for nomination - I know because I was working for an Academy member and he kept getting e-mails about screenings for this film. All that work, but it did pay off with two nominations, and one was for Best Picture, so I guess that's just what the promo teams need to do. 

THE PLOT: A powerful friendship develops between two young Black men as they navigate the harrowing trials of reform school together. 

AFTER: I can't really fault the story being told here, because it's based on a book, which is based on a true story, that of the Dozier School in Florida, also known as the "Florida School for Boys" if you want to find it on Wikipedia. It was a reform school in Florida that was founded in 1900 and had a long history of abuse as part of its "reform" process, and as you might expect, black boys were abused at a higher rate, got worse treatment than the white inmates, and there were secret burials when students died or were killed, as mass graves were later found closer to the black facilities. Not that white boys didn't get abused, they just lived to tell their stories in greater numbers. 

The story here is told in a very heavy-handed way - not that there WAS a light-handed way to tell this story, it's dark heavy matter, but then it's really all about tone, isn't it?  The film chooses to tell the majority of the story in the P.O.V. format, so usually the camera is showing us what one of the two main characters is seeing, so yeah, that's a bit of a gimmick and gimmicks are usually distracting, like the one used in "Here". Some of the events are depicted from just behind the lead character, which isn't exactly the same thing, it's more third person than first person, or more first person than P.O.V., whichever. This format is just confined to the flash-forwards, which depict one of the main characters living in NYC years later, and events in the news and his life make him reflect on his time at the Nickel Academy. 

Elwood Curtis is the everyman, or the every Black man, his experiences are meant to be symbolic, like he's an amalgam of many different black youths who may have experienced some of the same things. He's born into the Jim Crow era in Florida, which means a certain set of rules for growing up right, and deviating from these rules may affect his chances. He's a big fan of Martin Luther King, as many people were, and this gives him hope, although then as you might imagine, much of that hope is pointless and circumstances prevent him from succeeding. He's raised by his grandmother because his father died in prison, and he does well in school, since he has a teacher who encourages to reject the history lessons provided by the textbooks. The teacher eventually turns him on to an accelerated study program at a black university, best of all the program is tuition-free, however he's forced to hitchhike there, and accepts a ride from a man in a stolen car, and when this man is arrested, Elwood is treated as an accomplice. 

This means a trip to reform school, and on day one the new inmates are told that they can earn their way out of the system by collecting merit points and working their way up through four levels, however the reality is that the system only moves up white boys and black teens are sent out to pick oranges or paint the staff's houses as free labor. So there's no financial motive to allow black teens to be set free until they're obligated to be released at age 18. And by that time, having spent years in the system and endured abuse and torture, it would be a very bad idea to allow those black teens to be free to tell anyone how the Nickel Academy is run, so the system also benefits if those teens should happen to have an "accident" and be buried somewhere in secret. They could easily just tell that boy's family that he caught the Spanish flu and died and nothing could be done to save him. 

Elwood forms a friendship with Turner, another student. Some scenes are depicted from Turner's P.O.V., in fact some of the scenarios between them we get to see from two angles, which is a bit confusing at first. Elwood's grandmother comes to visit him, but is not allowed to see him because he's in the infirmary - after being bullied by another student, the Nickel Academy staff chose to solve the problem by beating both students and Elwood needed to be hospitalized. So she settles for hugging Turner instead. Later we learn that she brought money to a lawyer to help appeal Elwood's conviction, only the lawyer skipped town with the money and set up a new practice in Atlanta. 

Elwood decides to keep a journal of violations and abuse that he's witnessed, also the illegal smuggling of drugs and state supplies being sold to locals. He convinces Turner to deliver the journal to a visiting inspector, but this only causes Elwood to be placed in "Hell", which is a hot-box cell on the roof of a school building. Turner rescues him from his confinement and the two decide to escape from the institution using bicycles. They're pursued but it appears that only one of them makes it out. There's a bit of a twist in the flash-forwards but I had to read the Wiki plot summary to really understand it. 

Some people really didn't like the POV gimmick, it seems, however other people compared it to "The Zone of Interest", that concentration camp film I watched way back on January 2 of this year. Can a film show us something by not showing us something directly? We never saw an overt depiction of Jews being killed in the camp, but you could get the idea by not looking directly at it, and I guess you can say the same sort of thing here. However, you just might find the constant use of POV and the non-visual presence of the main characters for most of the film to be distracting in itself. I guess that's up to you. 

Directed by RaMell Ross

Also starring Ethan Herisse, Brandon Wilson (last seen in "The Way Back"), Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor (last seen in "Lovely & Amazing"), Hamish Linklater (last seen in "One More Time"), Fred Hechinger (last seen in "Gladiator II"), Jimmie Fails (last seen in "Pieces of a Woman"), Ethan Cole Sharp, Daveed Diggs (last heard in "Trolls Band Together"), Sam Malone (last seen in "The Burial"), Mike Harkins (ditto), Billy Slaughter (ditto), Najah Bradley, Gabrielle Simone Johnson, Peter Gabb (last seen in "Green Book"), Bill Martin Williams (last seen in "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks"), Taraja Ramsess, Sean Tyrik, Bryant Tardy (also carrying over from "Queen & Slim"), Luke Tennie (last seen in "Shock and Awe"), Trey Perkins, Robert Aberdeen (last seen in "Heist"), Bryan Gael Guzman (last seen in "Night School"), Escalante Lundy (last seen in "Keanu"), Ja'Quan Monroe-Henderson, Nicholas Stevens, Rachel Whitman Groves (last seen in "Assassination Nation"), Lucy Faust (last seen in "We Have a Ghost"), Tanyell Waivers (last seen in "Ma"), Craig Tate (last seen in "King Richard"), Sara Osi Scott (last seen in "Hit Man"), Kaden Washington Lewis, Anthony Marble (last seen in "The Dirt"), LeBaron Foster Thornton, Jeremiah Eric Westbrook

with archive footage of Tony Curtis (last seen in "Blake Edwards: A Love Story in 24 Frames"), Sidney Poitier (last seen in "Call Me Kate"), Martin Luther King Jr. (last seen in "Rather")

RATING: 4 out of 10 alligators walking around (or is it all the same one?)

Queen & Slim

Year 17, Day 230 - 8/18/25 - Movie #5,114

BEFORE: All right, I don't want to jinx anything but I've got a couple things this week that are sort of like job interviews. Of course, I tried applying for things all summer long, this is really my first time job hunting while making full use of the internet, so I've got all the job sites sending me notices, I'm applying to every one that I feel I'm right for, and it's been a lot. But OF COURSE I get three interview inquiries just one week before the theater opens back up for student orientation for the fall semester. So really, if nothing comes from these interviews this week, I'll be OK, just keep doing what I've been doing, and September and October are going to be very busy months, but I'll still keep looking for another part-time gig, just in case. My chances of getting promoted at my current gig are now almost nil, but I won't get into that right now. Let me just handle these interviews this week and take it from there. 

I'm also going to get my hearing checked on Thursday, I already have a hearing aid for my right ear, but now I think I'm also losing hearing in my left ear, but I want to be sure. There were a few days where everything just sounded like I was underwater, but it's eased up a bit, so maybe I had a summer head cold or something. Anyway, I'm going to have it checked - three years ago when I settled on the hearing aid solution, I never bothered to try and find out WHY I was losing my hearing, so I should probably try to find out about that and make sure it's nothing serious. Between my job, interviews and the hearing test, really I've got a full week. I got the Dept. of Labor to count my second job last year, which has now raised my unemployment benefits, so at least there's money coming in while the school is basically on summer break. But that all changes next week. I will try to keep the chain alive while switching to early-morning rising, even if I have to double-up on the weekends. 

Gralen Bryant Banks carries over from "Hit Man". 

THE PLOT: A couple's first date takes an unexpected turn when a police officer pulls them over. 

AFTER: This is a film about a traffic stop gone wrong, involving a white officer and a black driver, there's certainly precedent for this in the real world, probably hundreds of times. Immediately it's a tense, racially charged situation, anything could happen, and we all know it's likely to end with the officer shooting someone because they didn't follow his instructions, or they tried to take cell phone video of him, or maybe he's just a bad racist dude on a power trip. Maybe there are a dozen ways this incident could go south, or maybe it will all be fine, if the black passengers just do everything he says and keep their tempers in check. That's the BEST possible outcome, but then of course, we wouldn't have a movie, would we, and even that BEST possible outcome implies some kind of racial hierarchy, just because of history, and any white man telling a black person what to do just strikes an all-too-familiar tone, then you add in the power the officer holds and the gun that's in his holster, and come on, somebody's going to get shot, aren't they? 

This would happen on a first date, too, wouldn't it? Queen and Slim met on Tinder and didn't do their best work trying to connect with each other during dinner, so they've already resolved that there will be no second date, he's just driving her home, and maybe swerved a bit too much, or he missed using his turn signal (so the cop SAYS) and now look where we are. The cop wants to pop the trunk and then maybe search the whole rest of the car, while Queen, an attorney, starts asking, "Do you have a warrant?" and threatening to pull out her phone. Yes, she should know better, but in the heat of the moment things get, well, heated, and the officer shoots Queen in the leg. Slim tackles him and ends up with his gun, and shoots the officer in self-defense. 

Sure, they COULD stay and explain the situation to the next cop that shows up, and maybe the dash-cam footage will back them up, but come on, what's to prevent the next cop from shooting them when he sees the dead cop in the street? So they ditch their cell phones and go on the run, from Ohio they cross the border into Kentucky and figure their best bet is to make their way down to New Orleans, where Queen has family. That's a 12-hour drive, at best, but they can't travel at top speed for fear of drawing attention to themselves. They run out of gas (and money) in Kentucky but the sheriff who gives them a lift to the gas station soon finds himself locked in their trunk while they drive off in his pick-up. Well, switching cars is another good way to avoid attention. 

They hit NOLA and visit Earl, Queen's uncle. He's some kind of pimp and he offers to let them stay for two nights because he owes Queen a big favor, but his fights with his girls are so loud that the cops come by on a noise complaint/domestic violence check, and that's not a good thing, not with two fugitives hiding in the house. So they get one of Earl's cars and directions for a helpful couple in the next state, Earl saved the man's life while in the military overseas. But after an evening dancing in a bar (where they're recognized, but it's a safe space) they encounter car trouble, and have to spend all the travel money Earl gave them to get the car fixed. 

By the time they reach the helpful couple, there are protests being organized in the towns they pass through, their wanted status has been made public, but as you might imagine, the people of color support them, not the police, and they've become some kind of black Bonnie & Clyde, only without the bank robbery. This is both harmful and helpful, because their images have been on every news broadcast, but they also encounter black police officers who secretly let them get away. 

The goal is to get to a man in Florida who can get them on an unlicensed plane to Cuba, but by the time they get there, the bounty on them is up to $500,000 which means they can't really trust anybody.  Essentially it's a race to the airport with the police not far behind, and no spoilers here about how it ends. But you can probably figure out how it HAS to end. 

I want to say this film arrived before its time, just a year after it was released George Floyd was in the headlines for being killed by police in Detroit while he was "resisting arrest". Then we had all those "Black Lives Matter" during the pandemic, which seems very similar to the nationwide protests depicted here. But this film isn't really about actual events, except that it is, in the way it's about every incident between a white cop and a black driver, all rolled into one and taken to the extreme. And for once taking the story to the extreme only makes it more powerful, instead of ridiculous. 

Directed by Melina Matsoukas

Also starring Daniel Kaluuya (last seen in "Nope"), Jodie Turner-Smith (last seen in "Murder Mystery 2"), Bokeem Woodbine (last seen in "Old Dads"), Chloe Sevigny (last seen in "Lizzie"), Flea (last heard in "Inside Out 2"), Sturgill Simpson (last seen in "Killers of the Flower Moon"), Indya Moore (last seen in "Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom"), Benito Martinez (last seen in "Fool's Paradise"), Jahi Di'Allo Winston (last seen in "We Have a Ghost"), D.A. Obahor (last seen in "Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F"), Bryant Tardy (last heard in "Leo"), Thom Gossom Jr. (last seen in "Jeepers Creepers 2"), Melanie Halfkenny, Brian Thornton, Joseph Poliquin (last seen in "Five Nights at Freddy's"), Little Freddie King, Karen Kaia Livers, Gregory Keith Grainger, Reynolds Washam, Andre De'Sean Shanks, Robert Walker Branchaud, Colby Boothman (last seen in "Beautiful Creatures"), Andy Dylan, Regina Swanson

with cameos from Soledad O'Brien (last seen in "Rather"), Gayle King (last seen in "Join or Die")

RATING: 6 out of 10 boxes of sneakers

Hit Man

Year 17, Day 229 - 8/17/25 - Movie #5,113

BEFORE: OK, I might have spoke a little too soon when I said I had the path to Christmas all worked out. I did what I call a "walk-through" of the films for the rest of the year - that's when I go on IMDB and move from one film to the next using the actors' pages as the links. What, doesn't everyone plan out their movies for the next four months? Just me?  Anyway, I got to mid-October and found a break in the chain, it turns out that Alia Shawkat is NOT in a film called "Life After Beth", I guess she was at one point but the IMDB page for that credit now says "Scenes Deleted", a phrase I just hate to see. So my chain was going to fall apart in the middle of the horror films, well I guess I'd rather learn about that now then find out at the last minute. 

So, time to circle the wagons and scrap that plan, try to come up with a new one. Or maybe not, maybe I could fix it, since there's so much overlap between the various horror films, and I've got those appearances color-coded so I can spot them right away. Maybe this problem just called for some quick surgery, get in, cut out the bad links, and either try to stitch the hole back up (it's happened before with the Doc Block, often quite naturally, if I remove a film the ones on either side might just connect) or put in some other films, like an implant of sorts to fill the gap? Well, stranger things have happened, I suppose.  I ended up removing four films (really, there was another potential break coming because IMDB doesn't confirm that Garry Marshall's voice is heard in "Hocus Pocus 2". (These are quality problems, I assure you...). Suddenly my chain of 25 horror films became a chain of 21 with a serious hole in the middle.

Cutting back to the next film on either side with a green link to another horror film - what else could close that gap? Could I keep the same entry point for September 30 and the same exit point for October 31, because that would be the best possible outcome. Well, sure, I found it, though I also had to reshuffle the deck a little, turn a group of five films around the other way, and I stuck some other horror films I was saving for next year (or the year after) in to close the gap. And, what luck, it turned out to be FOUR other films that closed the gap, so I don't have to change my counts in any other month. So it looks like I'll be watching that hot new vampire film "Sinners" sooner than I planned, and the "Hocus Pocus" films get tabled for another year. Those are the breaks. 

Two of the just-added horror films star an actor named Gralen Bryant Banks, and by coincidence he is in TODAY'S film also, and it's also his birthday, so a big SHOUT-out to Mr. Banks tonight. He'll probably never know that his acting roles just totally saved my horror chain from collapsing, and therefore he's saved Movie Year 17 as well. Thank you, Mr. Banks, born August 17, 1961, good tidings and here's to your health. He's popped up four times already this year, in the movies "Brothers", "The Burial", "The Lovebirds" and "Five Nights at Freddy's". Tonight makes five, and he'll be around for a couple more days, and then I'll see him again in October, not too shabby. He could end up with as many appearances for the year as Samuel L. Jackson and Elvis Presley. 

Glen Powell carries over from "Twisters" - I don't know what happened, I feel like there were a ton of Glen Powell films on my list, and I was going to make a whole chain out of them someday. But now I look again and I only see two left and one's a romance, so I've got to move on. Hey, Glen Powell might be a big star these days, but he's no Gralen Bryant Banks. Me, I'm just happy to have a confirmed path to Christmas again, it's now just 82 films away. 

THE PLOT: A professor moonlighting as a hit man of sorts for his city police department descends into dangerous, dubious territory when he finds himself attracted to a woman who enlists his services. 

AFTER: The premise here is that a rather ordinary college professor - albeit a very smart one, who teaches philosophy and such - would also dabble in electronics, being an expert in such things as microphones and cameras. He therefore gets hired by the New Orleans police to help with their surveillance efforts to convict a specific kind of criminal, those that would hire a hit-man to kill an enemy or a business partner or a spouse. Convicting such a person at the hit-man hiring stage would thus prevent a murder from taking place, saving a life, and not being an expert in these matters, I don't know if police departments are so forward-thinking when it comes to crime prevention. Maybe this is part of that "broken windows" philosophy, if you can identify a problem in a neighborhood before it gets out of hand, you can control the situation, and I can imagine the N.O.P.D. wanting to keep the murder rate down, because a high one would be bad for tourism. Still, that doesn't necessarily mean this is the way cops operate. I think mostly cops just wait for a crime to be reported, and then they head out to the scene. This kind of feels like entrapment, but if they can prove intent to hire a killer and money changes hands, I guess a lesser crime has been committed. 

When the usual undercover guy who pretends to be the hit-man gets put on suspension, naturally the cops turn to their surveillance guy to step in. Yeah, gotta call B.S. on this, because as he points out, he's not qualified, he's a temp civilian tech working for them, they can't put him in harm's way, and meeting with a person capable of hiring a contract killer is potentially dangerous. So you kind of have to suspend disbelief in a big way, because I think in the real world this wouldn't happen, the cops would either send in a real trained U.C. or call the operation off if they were THAT short-handed. 

Either way, Gary turns out to be really good at thinking like a killer, saying what a killer might say, and at least pretending like he's very good at killing people and disposing of the bodies. What he's not good at is remaining anonymous, so you know, what could POSSIBLY go wrong there?  There are scenes midway through the film of Gary appearing in court to testify against the people who were trying to hire his non-existent hit-man character, and they say his name in open court, plus he's sitting RIGHT THERE. What's to prevent someone who gets convicted of hiring a killer of serving their time, getting out and then looking up Gary Johnson?  Or bumping into him on the street and exacting their revenge?  Shouldn't the identity of an undercover (non-)cop be kept secret from the criminals? Like, isn't that the whole point?  Once an undercover cop appears in court to testify, doesn't that affect his ability to work undercover?  (Yes, I watch a lot of "Law & Order", and the real crime is that I have to watch the new season of "Organized Crime" streaming on Peacock - why can't they air it on NBC during the summer, when TV is mostly reruns anyway?)

Gary reacts differently when the person trying to hire him is Madison, a beautiful woman who's possibly being abused by her husband, and she feels the only way she'll be free is to hire a hit-man. Well, these sure seem like extenuating circumstances, and if she fears for her life, maybe they should do something about THAT - don't they have an SVU squad in New Orleans?  Gary might be right to turn down the job and tell her to use the money to get clear of her husband and disappear - but he get nothing but grief from the cops, because they would rather arrest the woman for trying to have her husband killed. NO NO NO, they should be following up by investigating the husband and/or putting this woman in protective custody, because if they did arrest her, what do you think her husband would do when he finds out what his wife got arrested for? He'd probably try to harm her or kill her just to cover up his history of abuse. So the cops are wrong here, and I'm on Team Gary.  

Gary keeps working on these cases, and kind of takes things to the extremes, developing complex back-stories and using accents and wearing different costumes, trying to tailor his personality to be whatever he thinks the client needs him to be. This may be a great acting showcase for Glen Powell, like it's good stuff for the demo reel, but is this realistic?  My guess is that it's not, but somehow this is a comic romantic crime film at the end of the day, so being believable kind of takes a back burner. Madison contacts him later and they meet at a dog rescue event, she tells Gary that she took his advice, got clear of her abusive husband, and is now getting a divorce. Deep down something tells her there's more to Gary than meets the eye, like how many contract killers enjoy teaching sports to kids and supporting rescue dogs?  She can't quite put the pieces together, though.  

They fall into a relationship, and treat her new house as a safe place, where they can both be free of whatever else is going on in their complicated lives. They go out on dates, and Gary even teaches Madison how to handle a gun. (Again, W.C.P.G.W.?). Well, it turns out that she might have been exaggerating a bit about the divorce, and of course she doesn't know anything about "Ron's" other life as Gary. There's some psychological meaning to all of this, like from Gary's philosophy class he probably said something about becoming the person you want to be, or reality being subjective or morality being fluid over time, but honestly this is all very muddled, it's still wrong to kill people, it's probably also wrong to pretend to be the type of person who kills people, and therefore it's probably pretty wrong to lead a woman to think that killing people is a viable solution to her problems. Yeah, but that's where we find ourselves at the end of a very complicated identity crisis. 

This could be an enjoyable film, but it kind of requires not thinking too much about how far-fetched it is. That's weird that it's based on a true story, but obviously the screenwriters must have changed a lot. 

Directed by Richard Linklater (director of "A Scanner Darkly" and "Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood")

Also starring Adria Arjona (last seen in "Sweet Girl"), Austin Amelio (last seen in "Everybody Wants Some!"), Retta (last seen in "80 for Brady"), Sanjay Rao, Molly Bernard (last seen in "Otherhood"), Evan Holtzman (last seen in "Civil War"), Gralen Bryant Banks (last seen in "Five Nights at Freddy's"), Mike Markoff, Bryant Carroll (last seen in "A Man Called Otto"), Enrique Bush, Bri Myles, Kate Adair (last seen in "Focus"), Martin Bats Bradford (last seen in "The Dirt"), Morgana Shaw (last seen in "I Love You Phillip Morris"), Ritchie Montgomery (last seen in "Geostorm"), Richard Robichaux (last seen in "Where'd You Go, Bernadette"), Jo-Ann Robinson (last seen in "We Have a Ghost"), Jordan Salloum (ditto), Jonas Lerway, Kim Baptiste, Sara Osi Scott, Anthony Michael Frederick (last seen in "The Lovebirds"), Duffy Austin, Jordan Joseph, Garrison Allen, Beth Bartley, John Raley, Tre Styles (last seen in "Jeff, Who Lives at Home"), Donna Duplantier (last seen in "Pain Hustlers"), Michele Jang, Stephanie Hong, Joel Griffin, KC Simms, Murphee Bloom, Roxy Rivera (last seen in "Jerry and Marge Go Large"). 

RATING: 6 out of 10 video games used as currency