On not watching movies and not blogging about it

My last post was on April 12th. Today is June 19th. Blogging is hard in 2026. I guess no harder than ever.

From April 12th to this morning, I have watched 16 features. 16 films in 68 days. I'm not winning any cinephile prizes these days.

I'm going to break down the films into categories and do the thing I pledged to do this year: write at least one sentence about each film.

I'm not going to write about any TV. There's been nothing really notable.

The '+' sign means a re-watch.

Hoopla Classics
The Man Who Would Be King (1975)
The Red House (1947)

King is late career Huston at his finest. A great script, great direction, great cinematography, and great performances. This is cinema.

Red House is the best David Lynch film not directed by David Lynch in 1947. I voted 'junk', but there are compelling elements present that seem like building blocks in a cinematic gothic grammar that has continued to develop and erupt in films up to the present.

Swan Memorial Classics
Now, Voyager (1942)
+Shane (1953)

Voyager exists in the same universe as Red House. Melodrama, emotional manipulation, big reveals and crisis moments. It's fine.

I always feel deficient when it comes to Shane. I cannot understand why it is so beloved. There are so, so, so many better 1950s Westerns, including so many better 1950s Westerns featuring the "stranger comes to town and saves the day" trope. I don't get it. My best guess is that most of the lovers of this film saw it young and identify with the annoying child in idealizing/idolizing the character Shane.

Soviet Club
The Golden Calf (1968)
Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears (1979)
Three Poplars on Plyuschikha Street (1968)

A good string of movies and good discussion. Golden Calf's pacing undermines its attempt at comedy/satire, but obviously good Soviet people disagree with me.

Tears and Poplars were watched weeks apart, but they'd make for a great double feature. Both are about young-to-middle-aged women experiencing city life while trying to make everyday choices as they figure out how to be satisfied and fulfilled in their lives. Tears is a melodrama that unfolds over decades (with a focus on two particular periods). Poplars* is a quieter "art film" that takes place over the span of two days, with most of the action centered on a single afternoon. Both are quite good on their own and even better in conversation with each other.

At Whim Personal Choices
Listers: A Glimpse Into Extreme Birdwatching (2025)
No Name on the Bullet (1959)
+Harold and Maude (1971)
Return of the Living Dead (1985)
Four Fast Guns (1960)
+Dead Man (1995
+The Straight Story (1999)
+Sullivan's Travels (1941)
+Lost Highway (1997)

Listers is a documentary about bird watching. I thought it was great and the guys behind it seem like genuinely good guys. The film can be watched for free on youtube. You should watch it.

No Name on the Bullet is the best new-to-me Western I've seen in a while.

Here's what I wrote:

I love unusual Westerns. One of my all-time favorite Westerns is Terror in a Texas Town that starts and ends with a gunfight settled by a whaling harpoon.
No Name on the Bullet is an unusual Western.
Audie Murphy, America's favorite WWII veteran, plays an assassin, John Gant, who has made a career out of murder. He is paid to kill, but this isn't an average hitman movie. Gant's technique involves provoking the target to attack first, making all of his kills acts of legal self-defense.
Provoking. Through his life and actions, through his reputation, Gant's very presence has become a provocation. His arrival at a small town instigates a viral explosion of fear. Everyone in town who has done anything wrong (read: everyone!), who knows that someone somewhere dislikes them, feels fear at the presence of this hired killer. Who is he there to kill? Could it be one of them? The biggest criminals, those involved in serious big money sin, are the ones most afraid, and guilty consciences lead to bad decisions.
At the same time, a local boy grown up has come back home to town after being away studying to be a medical doctor. The relationship of mutual respect between the hired killer and the hired healer is the heart of the film. Interestingly, this relationship is expressed visually/thematically through a chess match, and this aspect of the film is discussed in the recent TCM introduction to the film, which you can watch below. The relationship explores the shades of grey between the "black and white" roles of hero and villain.
The film is competently directed by Jack Arnold. There may not be any truly memorable shots that stick with you, but the story is told well and the actors are all used to the best of their abilities. The smart script is written by Gene Coon, who would go on to have success in television, including writing some good episodes of the original Star Trek tv series.
I love 50s Westerns. No Name on the Bullet is a very good one. Highly Recommended.

Harold and Maude was important to me as a teenager. I've fallen out of love with it, but not completely. It still has charms.

Return of the Living Dead was not as stupid as I thought it would be. The script is funny at times and the filmmaking is solid. Better than it has any right to be.

Four Fast Guns was a disappointment, a low budget Western out of place in 1960, but the last 10 minutes are pretty good, so I can forgive the long, boring middle.

Dead Man is still a movie that I admire more than I like. It's often beautiful to look at, and I still love the Neil Young score. I think it just maybe feels more like a goofy academic visual essay than a narrative film, which is fine, but outstays its welcome for me as commentary on the genre and history because it never coheres into anything profound for me.

The Straight Story, on the other hand, is a film that has only gotten better with age. My age. The film's age. This is an old man's movie. I'm starting to understand it better. I've always loved this movie, but it has risen even higher in my estimation. 5/5 stars, perfect film, essential.

Sullivan's Travels is another film that gets better each time I watch it. Though it's still not quite essential for me, it's easily near the top of any Top 10 Hollywood Films About Hollywood list that I make and probably high up on a 40s decade list. Maybe I should make some updated Top 10 (20? 30?) of XXXX Decade lists. That could be fun.

Finally, Lost Highway. Re-visiting The Straight Story had me feeling so warmly towards Lynch that I wanted to re-visit other Lynch from around the same time that I've never quite liked. After another watch of Lost, I still agree with my hero Roger Ebert, and I can't write it any better than he did (indeed, this is one of the best opening sentences to any of his reviews):

David Lynch’s “Lost Highway” is like kissing a mirror: You like what you see, but it’s not much fun, and kind of cold. It’s a shaggy ghost story, an exercise in style, a film made with a certain breezy contempt for audiences. I’ve seen it twice, hoping to make sense of it. There is no sense to be made of it. To try is to miss the point. What you see is all you get.

Alright, that brings me up to the present. I'm going to renew my efforts here and try for a more stable, weekly-ish posting. We'll see.

Keep watching, CR5FC. See you at the movies.