Path: news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: "Ian J. Ball" <ijball@mac.invalid>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv
Subject: Re: What Did You Watch? 2025-01-23 (Thursday)
Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2025 14:25:39 -0800
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Just fixing the header...

On 1/24/25 10:43 AM, Ian J. Ball wrote:

> On 1/24/25 1:30 AM, Ubiquitous wrote:
> 
>> What did you watch?
> 
> Yesterday was my last meeting before classes start next week. So I 
> decided to focus a little more on movies (off Tubi), and I ended up only 
> watching one soap:
> 
> soaps: DOOL - Wed's ep. Ha! Stephanie admits to Alex that she wanted to 
> be with him all along (I *knew* it!), and they were sort of "working 
> through their stuff" when Joy (who won't see this coming!) arrives and 
> drags Alex off to see Bonnie (who wasn't in this ep) in the hospital. 
> Earlier, Joy talks over Bonnie's situation with Kate (Kate, of course, 
> is trying to blame Bonnie!), and then Joy admits that Alex is the only 
> person in Salem who has been decent to her (wait until she finds out 
> about Alex and Stephanie!!)... Otherwise it was "soap sabotage" stuff - 
> Jada questions Kerry, and can't tie him to the Bonnie stuff (or the 
> poisoned cupcakes). They "show us" (but don't show us the face of) 
> someone "crossing Bonnie" of their list, and it looks like Alex may be 
> their next target - as this doesn't seem to be Hattie, I can't figure 
> out who this is.
> 
> Then I watched two (disappointing!) movies off Tubi:
> 
> Night Blooms (Tubi) - A 2022 Canadian flick - this is pretty typical of 
> Canadian indie flicks, portraying Canada as a pathetic country filled 
> with pathetic youth and pathetic adults/parents. (Yes, *everyone* is 
> pathetic in this film - there's not on non-pathetic character!) The only 
> wrinkle is that this is set in the 1990s - so is Canada even more 
> pathetic now?!
>     P.S. Filmed in Nova Scotia, just to make it even more pathetic(!?!).
>     Anyway, I watched this because it stars Jessica Clement, and as I 
> expected she's the best thing about this film by far - her character is 
> also pathetic, but at least Clement has the ability to attack the role 
> with gusto - Clement really does deserve more and higher profile roles: 
> she recently had a memorable guest stint on "Cross".
>     Ostensibly, this is about how Clement's 17-year old character 
> targets and seduces her bestie's (Alexandra McDonald, not to be confused 
> with the superior Allie MacDonald who hasn't seen to done much in the 
> last 5 years or so...) father, played by Nick Stahl (and, wow - he looks 
> old now!). Of course, this leads to disaster for all involved. But, 
> they're all rundown pathetic Canadians anyway, so who cares?!
>     And, being a Canadian indie, they of course add unnecessary 
> elements, like how Clement's character is seemingly guided(?)/haunted(?) 
> by an EVOL! "spirit woman" who looks like a hipster lesbian(!?!).
>     So, this flick was good for Clement, but bad for everything else, 
> and I don't think I would recommend this even for fans of Jessica Clement.
> 
> Final Girl: Halloween (Tubi) - I found most of this supposed 
> "horror" ("psychological horror"?) to be quite mild. I guess that's 
> another way of saying it's actually very "mid"...
>     That is, until the ending, when I thought the whole film fell apart.
>     The set up is this: high school girl (Krystal Lynn, a redhead though 
> not quite as attractive a redhead as the similarly named redhead 
> Stephanie Lynn from "Little Black Lie" that I watched recently...) 
> survives a slaughter at a house party where masked-killer kills everyone 
> else, including her boyfriend, but not her.
>     This is an OK set-up, though as a horror "slaughter", this opening 
> sequence is undeniably "mild" (or listless/lacking in urgency or proper 
> horror atmosphere!).
>     The problem is everything that comes after - her friends seem 
> generally unsupportive, and the other kids at the highschool are so mean 
> and cruel to her that it defies believability.
>     I also disliked most of the casting - for example, I didn't believe 
> for a minute that the actors cast as her parents would have produced 
> this pale redheaded daughter! (Get the basics right, people!)
>     Once back to school, the killer continues killing, and then it 
> becomes a mystery to figure out who the masked-killer is. Meanwhile, the 
> final girl's mean father stonewalls the poor downtrodden detective on 
> the case (who is paired with an idiot "comedy relief" uniformed cop, 
> which was another discordant element of this film!).
>     But the real problem is that this falls apart with the ending.
>     Basically, almost this entire same premise was covered, and covered 
> *much better*, back in the 2015 film "Last Girl Standing" - now that 
> film actually delved much more deeply into the psychological horror 
> aspects, and was substantially better in delivering its ending.
>     I did like a couple of the supporting players here: Grace Winters 
> (no picture on IMDb, despite having a decent-sized filmography) as one 
> of the final girl's besties, and Nathaniel Hinson as the slacker 
> (neighbor?) dude who has an obvious crush on the final girl. No one else 
> really stood out here.
>     Anyway, if you want this kind of flick, skip this one, and go with 
> the much more harrowing "Last Girl Standing".
> 
> 
> What did you watch?