Remember the Night (1939)

I've seen this a few times but had never before watched it with Gary and, somehow, seeing it with him deepened the story for me. Though Stanwyck's character is a shoplifter, it's clear that she made the same mistake that MacMurray's character did in his youth: stealing from mom. The difference is that his mother used it as a teachable moment, instilling in him honesty and justice, while hers publicly shamed and rejected her, teaching her nothing other than "better not get caught." When she's able to spend a week with his family, their welcoming spirit of kindness goes to work on her and makes her want to be better.

I was wrong in my original review when I said that there's only one surprise in this movie -- it zigs when we expect zags. It both fills the heart and makes me want to extend forgiveness rather than to dispense judgment.

A-

One Battle After Another (2025)

A far-left revolutionary group wreaks havoc on the establishment, including a facility holding immigrants on the Mexico/U.S. border. Lockjaw, the bigoted head honcho at the facility, takes an interest in Perfidia, a black leader romantically involved with Pat, the explosives expert for their group. When she has a baby, Pat's ready to scale back the work to prioritize parenthood, but she is uninterested and is eventually scooped up by authorities and pressured to talk, causing Pat to leave town with his daughter to live under assumed names.

I am not a fan of Paul Thomas Anderson, but I'm also not a hater -- he's just so inconsistent that when I hear his name I think neither "must see" nor "skipping it," but just "we'll see." For me, this one is definitely nearer the top of the list than the bottom. DiCaprio is paranoid magic here: just doing everything he can to keep his daughter safe, while coping with the mess that more than a dozen years of anti-sobriety have made of his memory. Penn also holds his own in a role that's much less fun.

This was a fun ride for sure, but Anderson needs to learn to kill his darlings -- there was no reason for this to be as long as it is.

B

Meet Me in St. Louis (1944)

I'm gonna sound like an awful grump here, but I really don't get the hype. Sure, there are a few songs in here that everyone (including me) knows and loves -- The Trolley Song, Meet Me in St. Louis, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas -- but the movie that introduced them to the world is an empty (but pretty) affair.

The two elder Smith daughters are hormonal and looking for romance, the youngest is a tomboy, and the other one is just kind of around. There's also a brother and a grandpa. Mom is longsuffering and Dad is a sourpuss that the rest of the household has to tiptoe around to get what they want. But they live in St. Louis! And the World's Fair is coming to St. Louis! Yay!

Basically, I think this movie was wildly popular in 1944 because a colorful bit of escapism was welcome during World War II and it's been coasting on nostalgia ever since.

C+ 

Hunger (2023)

Aoy, a young woman working as the cook in her family's noodle shop, gets scouted to try out for a spot in the small support staff of Chef Paul. We've seen this type of boss many times before: so revered that his abuse (both mental and physical) is tolerated because the dude's a "genius." We've also seen Aoy's type of journey before: suffering the indignities because she both values what she's learning and respects him for what he's accomplished. But, eventually, she has to walk away to make her own choices and mistakes.

Though I enjoyed this for what it was, I also was (ironically) hungry for more. This is one of those scripts that somehow runs long but feels incomplete. I barely knew these people by the end of the movie because there was so much focus and time given to style rather than story.

C+

Happy Christmas (2014)

After a break-up, Jenny moves in with her brother and his family until she can figure out what to do next. She almost seems like more trouble than she's worth: she embarrasses a friend by getting black-out drunk at a party, sleeps through a commitment to watch her nephew, and fills the house with smoke in the middle of the night when she forgets about the pizza she put in the oven. But she's also the catalyst to remind sister-in-law Kelly that she doesn't have to put her happiness on the back burner just because she's a mother now.

The story's not bad, but the mumblecore of it all makes it feel super thin, especially because neither Anna Kendrick nor Lena Dunham is any good at improvisation. The best actor in the whole dang thing is the toddler son -- but that's probably due to the cheat that his actual father is playing his fictional father.

D+