Best First Watches: September 2022
We are almost at the most magical time of the year: Spooky Season.
Let’s just address the elephant in the room: I know this is late. Listen, October is my birth month and I have had a lot going on in my life. Good stuff. Great stuff going on in my life. However, haven’t had great stuff in terms of movie watching! I don’t know! Maybe after nine months of not rewatching movies I’ve fallen into a bit of a rut. I just haven’t seen a movie I have wholeheartedly loved in a while and it’s kinda bumming me out. Anyway, I saw some movies I enjoyed, but I’m still searching for something to knock me on my ass like Everything Everywhere All At Once or Marcel the Shell with Shoes On.
As always, here are the previous installments: January, February, March, April, May, June, July, and August.
The Shawshank Redemption
Should I have seen The Shawshank Redemption prior to the year of our lord 2022? Yeah, probably, but in my defense, it’s not like a fun movie to queue up. Not often am I lounging around thinking, “yeah, let me watch this movie about how fundamentally flawed the prison industrial complex is.” Except if I’m talking about Holes. I am always in the mood to watch Holes. Anyway, Shawshank is as good as everyone implied it would be. I highly recommend reading Demi Adejuyigbe’s review because it says everything I thought in a much smarter way.
The Woman King
As soon as Lashana Lynch came on screen, my breath my simply taken away. Respectfully, that’s not my breath anymore. Lashana Lynch can have anything she wants from me. I had a couple issues with a plot point that comes up later in The Woman King. I think it skewed the film to a level of melodrama it didn’t need, but there is something so overwhelming about seeing a movie like this helmed by a woman in her late fifties.
Do Revenge
I’m a simple lesbian. You throw a candy-coated pastel set design over the plot of Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train and I will simply have a great time. Yeah, I could actually go into detail about how smartly written the plot was and how the twists actually make sense…or I could say that as a lesbian who grew up loving teen comedies, Do Revenge was made for me.
Unidentified Objects
I covered Fantastic Fest this year (from the comfort of my own home)! This was a standout feature for me because of its blend of science fiction and humanity. I also got to talk to the director! A stunning, life-affirming flick I must recommend.
Pearl
a24
This was probably the biggest surprise of the month for me. I didn’t love X, but I will say until the day I die that Brittany Snow is simply not in enough movies. X didn’t do a lot for me, but it did bring Snow back to the big screen for me and I’m thankful. Anyway, color me absolutely surprised that I loved Pearl. A nightmarish combination of Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Wizard of Oz. Simply deranged in a beautiful way. It’s Mia Goth’s world and we’re lucky enough to witness it.
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