Under a Red Roof

Finally! Part two of the Movie Bomb, just in time for holiday couch potato-ing??

Petite Maman – After some very strange alchemy, a woman staying in her childhood home finds her daughter befriending HER child self in the magic of the forest. Beautiful and contemplative.

Radiance – A photographer, slowly losing his vision, befriends an idealistic woman and creator of audio descriptions for the visually impaired. In their time together, he helps her “see” her words more fluently and see for himself, in a new way.

Relax, I’m From the Future – A lonely man from the 22nd century travels to the 2020s to gain an easy fortune from lottery winnings and sports betting. Unable to go it alone, he befriends a queer black woman to help him. All goes amok when attempting to change the unfolding of events, some catastrophic, and they are hunted by goons from the future. Fun and funny and Rhys Darby. His voice!!

See How they Run – Let me, before I get to it, tell you of my sincere admiration for Sam Rockwell. If he’s in it, I am going to watch it (him?), just because the man is magic!

This is an Agatha Christie style narrative, which includes her very own character in a murderous tale of molotov cocktails, adultery, blackmail, and poison! Let the games begin…

Self Reliance – A man, still reeling from the breakup of his long-term relationship, agrees to participate in a dark web survival game. If he can keep from being murdered(!!) for the next thirty days, he wins one million dollars (said with a Mike Meyers voice – IYKYK, but not really). The one caveat, for the killers, is that he can only be taken down while alone. So, he enlists the help of Craigslist strangers and a homeless man named James in the tip of the iceberg of absolutely unhinged goings on. Thank you, Jake Johnson. I LOVED it!

Society of the Snow – In October of 1972, a plane carrying a Uraguayan rugby team crashes in a remote mountainous area. This is their story, and boy, is it a doozy!

Sometimes I Think About Dying – Fran, great at her job (In Astoria, Oregon! Holla!), terrible with people, and with a vivid inner life envisioning her death in myriad forms, is jostled into reality when a new co-worker seeks out her friendship.

Spaceman – A solitary astronaut on a mission to explore a strange cloud of space dust befriends a telepathic spider who helps him recapture his humanity. Yeah, it’s weird, but also poignant.

Strawberry Mansion – In a bizarre future where dreams are taxed, a tax man travels to the remote Strawberry Mansion for a long overdue audit of an elderly artist. He stays in her home and slowly unravels the truth of the government and his own work, all while falling in love with the beautiful woman in the artist’s dreams.

The Civil Dead – A dead man, visible only to one living person and sort of friend, longs for connection, but the self-absorbed man with a wretched haircut really isn’t having it.

The Midnight Sky – George Clooney plays a scientist who ruminates on life, isolation, choices and their consequences in a post-apocalyptic life of polar frigidity.

The Paragon – This is another of my open in case of melancholy films! It is fun and funny and wholesome. Dutch, a self serving jerk of a man, has a near death experience and wishes to exact revenge on the person responsible for his disablement. Enter Lyra, an expert in psionic power, who is willing to train him to find the vehicle that struck him. Undisciplined and quite childish, he and Lyra are amazed when his abilities blossom, but are later thwarted by her evil brother Haxan. Together, they must unite against his ill intentions to save the day and the world!

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare – Based, however loosely, on a real undercover mission to circumvent Nazis off the coast of Africa, a small band of fabulous fighters must sail, undetected, to save the day. Terrific fun!

Viking – A group of aspirational astronauts isolated in a remote area of the countryside mimic the lives of real life explorers millions of miles away as a means of problem solving. Life gets interesting when the line between fiction and reality begins to blur. Super inventive!

Yonder – After his wife dies tragically young, a man is given the opportunity to join her in a different reality.

Why, hello there. I uploaded the pictures for this post, and the one that will follow, two months ago, temporarily forgot about it, then had only intermittent movie thoughts, until now. Today is the day for the first movie bomb!!

All of Us Strangers – Let us begin with something on the strange side, which you know I love. A man returns to his childhood home, only to find his deceased parents, just as they were before they died. He has dinner with them and returns for multiple visits to heal his past. At the same time, a man from his building shows interest in him and they establish a rapport, but not everything is as it seems. Beautiful and heartbreaking.

Disappearance at Clifton Hill – After witnessing the kidnapping of a one-eyed boy near Niagara Falls as a child, a troubled woman decides to investigate as an adult: disturbing truths are revealed and all sorts of chaos ensues. Plus, for the woman who loved a little intrigue as a kid and always wanted a miniature bottle of invisible ink, it is used here. Huzzah!

Freaky – My favorite kind of Vince Vaughn film, a little goofy, a little menacing. A high schooler exchanges bodies with a violent serial killer and must trade back before she is trapped forever in his physical form. So much hilarity (Vince’s voice and body with a teenage girl’s mind!) and mayhem, also serious gore. Steel yourselves…

Frybread Face and Me – A young boy from the city spends the summer on his grandmother’s ranch along with his cousin, who the majority cruelly call Frybread Face. It is a fish out of water tale in which humanity and love are found in abundance.

The Remarkable Life of Ibelin – A young man suffering from Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy enjoys a rich and complicated life via World of Warcraft, forming close relationships on the platform without revealing his personal truth. After his death, his parents reach out to the gaming community and learn his history. Gah! Have a box of tissues nearby, peeps.

In Her Place – A mother who feels trapped in a thankless marriage gains the luxury of living in the apartment of a woman on trial for murdering her romantic partner. It starts simply enough, accessing the home to retrieve clothes, and progresses by borrowing outfits, spritzing perfume, taking long afternoons, until she leaves her husband and sons for a sense of peace and autonomy, however temporary.

Into the Labyrinth – Not a popular fil-um on the review sites, but one I enjoyed nonetheless. A woman kidnapped and imprisoned in a below ground labyrinth escapes only to be forced into deprogramming via intensely psychological means. Nothing is as it seems!

Italian Studies – A woman loses her memory mid errand run and roams the streets of New York city in search of herself. Can you imagine??

Kajillionaire – Born into a family of heartless paranoid grifters, a lonely young woman yearns for the love and connection her parents are incapable of giving her.

Linoleum – A highly layered drama about an astronomer who aspired for the life of an astronaut but got a barely watched wannabe Bill Nye science show instead. An examination of a complicated family life, wrought in yearning, love, and sometimes, sadness. Some very pleasant surprises.

Ms. White Light – A father-daughter team helps the terminally ill and their families cope, and in some cases, radically fail, with the inevitable end.

Oh Lucy! Another layered tale of longing and depression, misunderstandings, mixed with learning English and travel to foreign lands. Vague enough for ya?

On the Rocks – A ridiculously wealthy smooth talker, serial philanderer, and fiercely loyal and protective father helps his daughter through a rough patch in her marriage.

Pagglait – After only five months of marriage, a woman finds it challenging to grieve the death of her husband, with whom she was not terribly close. Complicating the situation are his deeply grieving parents, who relied on him financially, an insurance payout meant solely for her, and a photograph of a beautiful mystery woman amongst his belongings.

Palm Springs – Hot damn, peeps! This is one of my favorite movies of the past few years, a rather fine open in case of melancholy type, as it brings me quickly to laughter. A couple at a wedding in Palm Springs goes through the stages of grief after learning they are trapped in a time loop together. Some excellent laughs, murder, and pandemonium here, also.

Perfect Days – A man leads a solitary, but not the least bit lonesome, existence as a janitor of some very posh Tokyo toilets. He reads books, listens to cassettes, has deep friendships with trees, nature, and people both known and unknown. An absolute stunner!