Room 237 (2012)

  This movie is proof that being intelligent doesn't actually mean you're useful.

Five "experts" discuss their interpretations of Stanley Kubrick's The Shining as voiceover interviews play over footage from various archival and other film footage.

These are not dumb people.  They are historians, professors, researchers, and archivists who fall into the trap of very smart people saying very dumb things.  The entire movie feels like an English Literature class in college where you're asked to close read a work for the first time.  The point of the exercise is not to discover the "true intent"; it's to show how varied the interpretations can be.  And yes, if you spend your entire career studying a particular facet of history, like the genocide of the Native Americans in the American West, or the Holocaust, you will then start seeing connections everywhere.  That is how human pattern-seeking works.  It is also how conspiracy theories work, that you've "figured it out" because you're so much smarter than other people, so of course you're going to be persecuted by the Government, as one gentleman dolefully expects to be audited by the IRS as punishment for speaking out about his theory that Kubrick faked the Apollo 11 footage of the moon landing.  

I suppose you could find this documentary entertaining in a "Boy, what won't they think of" kind of way but I did not.  It felt a little mean-spirited considering that some of these people seem genuinely mentally ill, while others were infuriatingly condescending.  I don't find that funny.  And the film itself doesn't question or present a point of view of its own, so it just comes off as a bunch of people ranting.  Again, that is not my thing.  If it's yours or you just really, really like The Shining and/or Kubrick and/or insane conspiracy theories, Room 237 is streaming on Shudder and AMC+.

The Ten Commandments (1956)

  Movie Club did a double feature for Easter with this and Prince of Egypt, but I'll take any excuse to talk about this movie.  Content warning:  blood, child death

After receiving a prophecy, Pharaoh Sethi (Cedric Hardwicke) orders all male Hebrew infants killed.  But Yochabel (Martha Scott) puts her baby in a basket and sends him down the Nile where he is found by Sethi's sister, Bithiah (Nina Foch).  Widowed and childless, Bithiah is thrilled to find a baby and raises him as her own, alongside Sethi's son, Rameses (Yul Brynner).  Sethi, too, loves Moses (Charleton Heston), favoring him above all others, and spurring the jealousy of Rameses by telling both men that whoever impresses him the most will become his successor to the throne of Egypt and win the hand of Nefertiri (Anne Baxter), who is already in love with Moses.  We know this because she literally never shuts the fuck up about it.  She talks about it so much, a spiteful servant (Judith Anderson) finally tells her that Moses isn't even Egyptian, actually, but was born to slaves.  Moses finds out, confronts Bithiah, finds his birth mother, has a whole existential crisis, and decides to give up being the ruling class to work in the mud pits making bricks with the rest of his people.  That lasts about five minutes before he gets pissed, murders the chief architect (Vincent Price), and is sentenced to banishment in the desert for the entire Intermission.  

This movie is 3 hours and 39 minutes long.  I am leaving out a lot.

He makes it to a well, scares off some miscreants, and wins the admiration of the seven daughters of Jethro (Eduard Franz), a Bedouin leader.  Moses marries Sephora (Yvonne de Carlo), objectively the hottest daughter, and settles down to be a shepherd in the foothills of Mt. Sinai, considered to be God's holy mountain.  Moses is still mad at God for the whole Hebrew-slaves thing, so he marches up to the mountain to tell Him to His face.  And lo, God spaketh to him, saying "You think you can do better, asshole?  Fine, it's your job now."  So Moses goes back to Egypt and confronts Rameses, who has become Pharaoh and married Nefertiri, and demands that Rameses free the Hebrew slaves.  Rameses replies with whatever hieroglyphics spell Fuck You, and then there are a bunch of really neat camera effects, and Passover gets invented.  Reeling from the death of his only son, Rameses give the Hebrews their freedom and there is a mass Exodus (tm) down to the banks of the Red Sea.  That's how long it takes before Nefertiri, mad that her one-time honey bunny didn't personally intervene to save her son from the wrath of God, manages to whip Rameses into righteous fury and pursue.  More incredible special effects happen and the Hebrews are saved once again.

Moses leads them to the foot of Mt. Sinai, then goes up to give a progress report to God.  It takes a little while, and Dathan (Edward G. Robinson), who has had a whole sub-plot through the movie that I just can't get into, convinces people that despite all the miracles they have seen, they really need to have a huge party with wine, dancing, music by Herb Alpert and his Tijuana Brass Band (no, really), and a giant golden idol they made from all the spoils they took from Egypt.  Moses, who has been sitting in the Biblical equivalent of HR for the last 40 days, comes back with the new Employee Handbook, sees the kegger happening, and has a come-apart.  And there's still like 20 minutes left in the movie.

I cannot overstate how much I love this movie.  It was hugely influential on me as a child.  I must have watched it at least a dozen times.  I have owned this on VHS, DVD, and Blu-ray.  It is an Epic.  Legendary director Cecile B. DeMille filmed this on location in Egypt, using thousands of extras, with the support of the Egyptian national army for the chariot scenes.  For a myriad of reasons, you could never make this movie again.  It's a little harder to find on streaming, but it is on YouTube and pops up perennially on ABC.

The Prince of Egypt (1997)

  Happy belated Passover!

Moses (Val Kilmer) is raised alongside Rameses (Ralph Fiennes) in the Pharoah's palace but discovers that he was actually adopted and is Hebrew, not Egyptian.  He flees into the desert after accidentally killing a slave overseer and has a religious awakening, returning to Egypt in order to free all the slaves, now under his former brother's control.

This is the Old Testament story of the Exodus, complete with 10 plagues and the parting of the Red Sea.  If you grew up in a Christian or Jewish household, you are familiar with this.  If you did not, the movie might be a little more inaccessible.  It isn't really interested in telling you why Moses does anything; more just assumes you already know, so it presents a version with a high-gloss finish.  It is a musical and the soundtrack is very good, which covers a lot of the narrative shortcuts.  Also, the animation is top-notch.  There are some really beautiful scenes in this, and it looks mostly hand-drawn with only a few CGI elements.  

I remember when this came out, but I don't think I watched it until it was on video.  I listened to the Whitney Huston/Mariah Carey end credits song probably a thousand times though.  If you don't do anything else, give the soundtrack a shot.  Unfortunately, the movie isn't available on streaming except for rental.  Might be worth it to you; but I'd suggest trying to find a copy at the library first.

Scream 2 (1997)

Happy Easter!  Here's a completely unrelated movie.    Content warning:  blood

Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) survived a pair of serial killers in high school only to be met by a worse fate: being played by Tori Spelling in the movie adaptation.  But when a copycat begins recreating the Woodsboro murders, Sidney must face her traumas head-on.

This has never been my favorite franchise.  I wasn't blown away by the original and I never really felt the need to go back to it, but considering it's on its 7th entry with an eighth on the way, I thought it might be time to give it a second look.

It's definitely funnier than the first one.  It leans into the meta aspects of being a sequel and I actually liked the dramatic recreations of the first movie with an entirely different cast.  (LOL, Luke Wilson with floppy emo hair.) The line delivery was the weakest part for me.  It felt like every actor was waiting for a dramatic musical sting after every line.  Maybe that's Wes Craven, maybe that's just the 90s style, but it sucked a lot of the fun out.  Still, I had a pretty good time overall.  

The whole collection is streaming on Paramount+ right now, if you're so inclined.

No Other Choice (2025)

  This did not get nominated for the Oscars this year and people called it a snub, but I think there were just a lot of really strong contenders.

Yoo Man-Su (Lee Byung-hun) gets laid off from his job at a paper factory after 25 years of service.  At first, he's hopeful but as the months pass, he grows increasingly desperate to reclaim his position.  He decides that the only way to get the job he wants at a rival paper company is to kill off the competition.

I was expecting this to be the Korean Kind Hearts & Coronets, and I wasn't wrong.  It's probably the funniest Park Chan-Wook film I've seen, but it could have used a shorter run time.  Also, surprisingly wholesome for a movie about murder.  And not just Lucy-wholesome, which is a totally different metric, but by normal people in Movie Club!

It's still only available for rent or to buy so give it another couple of weeks to hit one of the streaming services, but keep an eye out for it.  It's worth the watch.

Project Hail Mary (2026)

  This is the first film I've watched in theaters this year.  Once again, people are the worst thing about going to the movies.  

Dr. Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) wakes up on a spaceship with no memory of how he got there or why.  Slowly, he pieces together his memories of being an elementary school teacher approached by a woman (Sandra Hüller) leading a team to discover why the sun is dimming.  A swarm of  tiny interstellar organisms is moving through the cosmos, eating stars except for one called Tau Ceti.  Grace is sent to find out why but discovers that he's not the only one looking.  An alien from a planet in the Tau Ceti system is also trying to find out how to stop the astrophage from destroying his sun.  Grace and "Rocky" (John Ortiz) must overcome a number of obstacles, including an inability to share an atmosphere, to work together to save both of their worlds.

My ex listened to the audiobook in the car so I knew enough about the story to be interested in the movie.  I thought it was really well done.  Like if Interstellar was a buddy comedy.  Gosling continues to be a great comedic actor while Hüller is also great at being awkward and German.  It's also a deeply emotional and optimistic movie, something that I didn't realize I needed to see.  Rocky has A+ cute character design, which is really difficult without paradoilia.  Major shout out to the voice actor and puppeteer, John Ortiz, for being able to convey emotions vocally.

Big fan of movies being fun just to be fun!

Diane Warren: Relentless (2025)

Nominated for Best Original Song.  I mean, of course it is.  It would be so funny if this had been nominated for Best Documentary and won.  Like, that would have been the biggest slap in the face.    Content warning:  discussion of sexual assault, animal death (off-screen, cat)

Diane Warren has been writing songs for over fifty years.  Even if you had never heard of her, you know her.  She has #1 singles in every decade, sung by dozens of artists.  She has her own production company, platinum records, a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.  But the one thing she did not have was an Oscar.  She has the dubious distinction of being the only woman nominated 15 times (16 this year) without a competitive* win.  She is loud, single-minded, and not particularly personable.  And in an award competition based in no small part on how well your peers like you, that's a major disadvantage.  

The documentary is kind of a puff piece; a look inside the often chaotic world of a neurodivergent creative professional.  It's interesting to see her process and the interviews with her very famous music clients are charming but unless you're super invested in songwriting or a big Oscar fan, there's really nothing else here.  It's streaming on Kanopy.

*She got an honorary one in 2022.