film | the m0vie blog

338. Le fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain (Amélie) (#102)

Posted on June 24, 2023 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and with special guest Síomha McQuinn, This Just In is a subset of The 250 podcast, looking at notable new arrivals on the list of the 250 best movies of all-time, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users.

This time, Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Le fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain.

Amélie Poulain has always been something of a special person, somebody who sees the world in a way that nobody else around her understands. Living a life of quiet desperate, freak events throw Amélie into the life of a complete stranger. The feeling is exciting to Amélie, who takes it as her mission to start meddling in the lives of all those around her. However, Amélie very quickly discovers that such meddling is rarely as tidy as one might hope.

At time of recording, it was ranked the 102nd best movie of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

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Filed under: Movies, The 250 | Tagged: film, france, imdb, Jean-Pierre Jeunet, lady di, manic pixie dream girl, Movie, paris, podcast, princess diana, quirky, síomha mcquinn, The 250, whimsy | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On “The Flash” as a Movie About the Horror of “The Flash”…

Posted on June 19, 2023 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With The Flash releasing this weekend, it seemed like as good an opportunity to talk about the themes of the movie, and how those ideas exist in direct opposition to its central purpose.

Thematically, The Flash is a story about how the idea of a “reset” is fundamentally pointless. It is a tale about how individuals are often the sum total of their life experiences, including the traumatic ones, and that any attempt to erase those traumas would be to erase the person that they created. However, this is very much at odds with what the film functionally is. It is an opportunity for Warner Bros. to shift around their established continuity and intellectual property, to reset characters and to recast actors. In short, The Flash is a movie about its own monstrosity.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: continuity, film, intellectual property, metaphor, Movie, production, reboot, reference, reset, the flash, theme, trauma | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the Question of What Even is a Movie Anymore…

Posted on June 12, 2023 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. Given the summer blockbuster season will see the release of Fast X, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse and Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning, Part One, it seemed as good a point as any to ask a seemingly simple question with a surprisingly complex answer: what even is a movie these days?

In theory, it has always been relatively easy to define a film. Not only is that the name of the medium itself, it has always historically been a self-contained unit of narrative. There is a palpable difference between a film and a television show, or a film and a stage play. However, in recent years, those boundaries have become a bit more porous, and it’s come to feel just a little bit like blockbusters are just very long and very expensive instalments in long-runing television shows.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: cliffhangers, dune: part two, fast x, film, format, medium, mission: impossible - dead reckoning part one, spider-man: across the spider-verse, Television | Leave a comment »

334. John Wick: Chapter 4 (#181)

Posted on April 29, 2023 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released every second Saturday at 6pm GMT, with the occasional bonus episode between them.

This time, Chad Stahelski’s John Wick: Chapter 4.

Still exiled and alone, John Wick wanders through the global criminal underworld. As his friends fall around him and the knives of the High Table close in around him, the assassin finds himself contemplating an uncomfortable question. What does he actually want? What can he actually accomplish?

At time of recording, it was ranked 181st on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

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Filed under: This Just In | Tagged: action, commentary, donnie yen, film, franchise fatigue, hiruyuki sanada, john wick, john wick: chapter 4, just the two of us, Keanu Reeves, martial arts, morality, Movie, nobody, podcast, rules, society, The 250, This Just In | Leave a comment »

280. Apocalypse Now (#53)

Posted on March 18, 2023 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, this week with special guests Alex Towers and Brian Lloyd, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released every second Saturday at 6pm GMT, with the occasional bonus episode between them.

This time, Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now.

In the midst of the Vietnam War, Benjamin Willard is given a special assignment. He is tasked with taking a patrol boat up the Nung River in pursuit of Colonel Walter Kurtz. Kurtz has apparently gone completely rogue, no longer responding to directives from command. Willard is instructed to terminate Kurtz’s command, by any means necessary. However, as Willard journeys deeper into the country, he finds himself drifting further and further from reality, embracing some sort of primal insanity.

At time of recording, it was ranked 53rd on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

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Filed under: The 250 | Tagged: alex towers, america, apocalypse now, Audio, brian lloyd, film, Filmmaking, francis ford coppola, marlon brando, martin sheen, Movie, podcast, psychedelia, season, trip, vietnam, Vietnam War | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the Pre-Packaged Cult Appeal of “Cocaine Bear”…

Posted on March 1, 2023 by Darren

We’re launching a new column at The Escapist, called Out of Focus. It will publish every Wednesday, and the plan is to use it to look at some film and television that would maybe fall outside the remit of In the Frame, more marginal titles or objects of cult interest. This week, we took a look at the release of Cocaine Bear, which is an obvious attempt to manufacture a cult hit.

On one level, it seems like a fool’s errand to try to build a movie with the express purpose of making a cult hit. After all, cult hits only grow organically, often over years and through home media or television. However, changes to the industry – including the collapse of home media and the decline of linear television – make it very difficult for movies to find that sort of niche. Cocaine Bear feels like a movie designed with that understanding in mind, a film very consciously pitched towards streaming virality as much as theatrical box office.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: cocaine bear, cult, cult hit, cult movie, film, home media, Movie, rental, streaming, Television, universal, video stores | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On Hitting “Peak Marvel”…

Posted on February 24, 2023 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the reports that Disney+ will only be streaming two Marvel shows this year and the decision to move The Marvels out of summer and into November, it’s interesting to contemplate whether we’re already past “Peak Marvel.”

“Peak Marvel” is a reference to “peak oil”, referring to the point at which production reaches its apotheosis, where there is so much content being produced that it is unsustainable for any number of reasons. The Marvel Cinematic Universe remains one of the most successful multimedia franchises ever, but it has been flooding the market for the better part of two years. There are signs, both in the wider industry and within the brand itself, that this model is not sustainable. The question is what comes next.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies, Television | Tagged: ant-man and the wasp: quantumania, blockbuster, Content, film, in the frame, loki, marvel, Marvel Studios, mcu, peak, peak marvel, the escapist, the marvels, volume | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Video! “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is a Buggy Start to Phase 5”

Posted on February 16, 2023 by Darren

I’m thrilled to be launching movie and television reviews on The Escapist. Over the coming weeks and months, I will be joining a set of contributors in adding these reviews to the channel. For the moment, I’m honoured to contribute a five-minute film review of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which was released in cinemas this weekend.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: ant-man and the wasp: quantumania, film, mcu, Movie, review, the escapist | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On “The Witcher: Blood Origin”, “The Rings of Power”, and the Limits of Fidelity…

Posted on January 5, 2023 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist this week. With the recent release of The Witcher: Blood Origin on Netflix and the ongoing arguments about the perceived “faithfulness” around The Rings of Power, it seemed like a good time to explore how the quality of a work relates to its alleged faithfulness.

To put it simply, quality and fidelity are completely different metrics. It is entirely possible for a fiathful adaptation of source material to be terrible, for example the shot-for-shot remake of Psycho. It’s also possible for an adaptation that has nothing to do with even the tone and genre of the original property, such as 21 Jump Street, to be brilliant. Ultimately, The Witcher: Blood Origin and The Rings of Power are adaptations that fail on their own measure.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Television | Tagged: comedy, escapist, faithfulness, fidelity, film, genre, new, Psycho, Television, the escapist, the lion king | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How Film Culture Became Online Culture…

Posted on December 5, 2022 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the publication of the once-in-a-decade Sight & Sound poll last week, it seemed like a good opportunity to dig into the results and consider what they say about modern film culture.

The list has provoked some response online for being too modern and too recent, including films like Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Get Out, Moonlight and Parasite. However, it’s part of a rich tradition of updating and modernising the cinematic canon. The most interesting aspect of the list is the way in which it demonstrates how film culture is online, how so many of the films to appear and climb on the list did so by becoming more readily and available, and by being embraced by an internet-literate generation of film critics.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.