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Recent reviews

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  The Northman 2022

  Watched by Jordan Smith 29 Apr 2022

  Elden Ring movie. Apparently that’s a bad thing

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  Jimmy Savile: A British Horror Story 2022

  Watched by Jordan Smith 28 Apr 2022

  Boilerplate stuff, formally speaking, but I really liked how they spent almost the entire first half on Savile building up his public persona as a caddish eccentric and altruistic do-gooder rather than constantly toggle between his fame and his heinous crimes. The choice to focus solely on one victim is also a strong decision imo. More effective and keeps it from feeling exploitative

Popular reviews

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  Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood 2019

  Rewatched by Jordan Smith 29 Jul 2019 26

  This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

  The scene that continues to reverberate through my mind is the abrupt flashback that implies Cliff murdered his wife. I think it’s the key to the film but every time I have a grasp on it, it slips through my fingers. It fundamentally alters the movie, recontexualizing what’s come before and charging what comes after. People around us laughed but it didn’t strike me as comedic. There’s this deeply embedded notion that, no matter how personal Tarantino claims his work…

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  Jackie Brown 1997

  Rewatched by Jordan Smith 16 Aug 2018 23

  • Tarantino, like PTA with Magnolia, made a young man’s old man film, an elegy to vinyl in the jewel case era. (Fitting that Max compromises with a cassette.) It’s somewhat self-fulfilling that a director making something about the difficulty of aging, of being a walking relic, would immediately retreat into the past — or pastiche — for the rest of his career. Reappraisal has hardened into consensus (on LB, anyway) but the trajectory his career would’ve taken had this…