Television-wise, I caught up with the second season of the excellent Batman: Caped Crusader. I also watched the recent fourth season of Reacher, which was fine, but was also definitely the least of the four seasons. We can hope that it will improve on a fifth season. Finally, I finished Person of Interest, which I enjoyed for Michael Emerson, could have lived without Jim Caveiezel, and ultimately feel like it comes across as apologia for AI. Still, it ain't the worst I've watched.
What I’ve Caught Up With, September 2026
Film: My Dead Friend Zoe (2024)
Afghan war vet Merit (Sonequa Martin-Green) deals with PTSD as best she can, which includes the constant companionship of Zoe (Natalie Morales), her friend from the Army who, now that she’s dead, appears only as a sort of apparition that only Merit can see. She’s also dealing with a counsellor (Morgan Freeman) who wants more effort from her and a grandfather (Ed Harris) dealing with the onset of Alzheimer’s. As she tries to navigate her grandfather’s illness and the possibility of a new romance with Alex (Utkarsh Ambudkar), who runs the local assisted living facility, Merit attempts to deal with the world as she sees it now. This is funny and sweet and heartbreaking. It’s Natalie Morales—funny, sardonic, and cruel—who steals the show here, but the whole cast is good. I’d love to see more of Martin-Green and Ambudkar.
Film: The Man from Earth (2007)
Imagine that you are a college professor, and a colleague that you have known for 10 years suddenly decides to leave. At his going away party, he reveals to you that he has been alive for 14,000 years, deciding to leave every 10 years or so when people start to realize that he doesn’t age. That’s the premise of The Man from Earth. John Oldman (David Lee Smith) reveals his reality to a group of his fellow teachers, all of whom can’t really believe what he is telling them, but wondering how he seems to have an answer for every question. This movie is just a conversation between people, but it’s fascinating and engrossing. I really, really like this movie, and it’s lovely to see Tony Todd in a role that doesn’t involve horror.
Film: Ladies of Leisure (1930)
This is very obviously a pre-Code film and honestly nothing special beyond the fact that it made Barbara Stanwyck a star. She’s clearly got the goods and with the possible exception of the tragic Marie Prevost, she outclasses everyone on screen. That’s the biggest issue with this one—Stanwyck is gloriously alive and she has to work across from Ralph Graves, who is a mildly attractive plank. Party girl Kay (Stanwyck) becomes the model of an extremely wealthy artist named Jerry (Graves) while being pursued by Jerry’s drunk friend Bill (Lowell Sherman). It’s drippy and the sexual politics are basically that the wildly vibrant Kay needs to give up being her own woman to catch a man. Babs could do better.
Film: Rock of Ages (2012)
I knew within the opening couple of minutes of Rock of Ages that I was going to be in for a tough two hours. As someone who graduated from high school in the mid-‘80s, a rock opera based on 1980s rock music should be right up my alley. But if you can’t tell where this is going—young girl with musical aspirations shows up in LA to be singer and hooks up with a kid who wants to be a start musician—you’ve never seen a movie before. Get rid of the musical numbers, and this is an early version of La La Land, and about as obvious in the plot department. Done well, this story is Hairspray, but this is no Hairspray. Tom Cruise as a burned-out rocker is the high point, but everyone else can piss up a rope, especially Russell Brand, who is a reprehensible piece of garbage. Seriously, fuck that guy.
Film: Doomsday Book (2012)
The title of this science fiction anthology from the Korean is literally “Report on the Destruction of Mankind,” which should tell you where this is going to go. The first film tracks a zombie outbreak, the second deals with the possibility of a robot achieving enlightenment, and the third with a sort of cosmic Amazon.com. As with all good science fiction, the stories are still relevant today. The first, which is a zombie story where the plague is essentially created by a lack of proper oversight in food safety, hits especially hard in a world where we have diarrhea lettuce and glass showing up in baked goods. Honestly, it was refreshing to see an anthology film that wasn’t horror, even if part of it actually is horror.
Film: An Inspector Calls (1954)
A wealthy family at dinner is visited by a police inspector (Alastair Sim), who tells them that a young woman has just committed suicide. As he explains what has happened, he shows that each of them has been complicit in one way or another in what led her to take her own life. While this is ostensibly about the young woman who died (a very rare movie role for Jane Wenham), the truth is that this is far more about the callousness and carelessness of the wealthy at the expense of those who work for them. Films like this have only become more relevant, and this is a damned good one, in large part because of the presence of the great Alastair Sim, who is as good here as he is in his most famous role as Scrooge.
Film: Brother Orchid (1940)
Gangster Little John Sarto (Edward G. Robinson) retires from his criminal ways and heads to Europe, where he thinks he’ll gain class. What happens is that he’s swindled by everyone possible and loses all his money. When he returns, his mob, led by Jack Buck (Humphrey Bogart) refuses to give up control. Only John’s girl Flo (Ann Sothern), her admirer Clarence (Ralph Bellamy), and Johnny’s friend Willie (Allen Jenkins) remain loyal. A failed hit puts Johnny in a monastery led by Brother Superior (Donald Crisp), where he feigns being a monk until he can get back at his enemies. This is just enough of a gangster movie to work with Robinson’s reputation and funny enough to be surprising. This isn’t anyone in the cast’s best movie, but it’s not close to their worst, either.
Film: The Beguiled (2017)
There are times when I genuinely don’t understand casting decisions. The Beguiled is a film that takes place during the American Civil War. So, naturally, we’re going to have the Irish Colin Farrell as a wounded Union soldier named John McBurney under the care of Australian Nicole Kidman as a Southern school marm. To be fair, Farrell’s Irishness is explained at one point. This is not a Civil War movie, but a film about power and sexual politics. McBurney, a clear enemy of the Confederate women in a school for girls, is also a figure of desire for all of them, even the youngest and those who are convinced that Union soldiers exist only to take sexual advantage of pure Southern belles. Good performances all around, including from Elle Fanning and Kirsten Dunst, who is always better than people think she will be. No shock at her presence, though; she’s always been a favorite of director Sofia Coppola.
Film: Murder, Inc. (1960)
A crime drama that is also one of Peter Falk’s first major film roles, this tells what it purports to be the true story of a murder-for-hire crime syndicate. Abe Reles (Falk) goes to work for Lepke Buchalter (David J. Stewart) and Mendy Weiss (Joseph Bernard) as enforcers. Reles leans on Joey Collins (Stuart Whitman) and his wife Eadie (May Britt) to assist in a murder. Lepke then threatens them into silence. Eventually, the actions of the gang can no longer be ignored, and Lepke is turned over to the police by his own gang. Lepke, through Mendy, starts to eliminate everyone who has information, which includes Joe and Eadie. It’s a fine little procedural thriller, but ends far too abruptly to really be satisfying. End this 40 seconds earlier or 10 minutes later. As is, it feels like a let-down.
Film: Freaked (1993)
How exactly does someone explain this sadly overlooked Alex Winter project? Spoiled child star Ricky Coogan (Winter) is asked to endorse a fertilizer of questionable properties. He winds up at a freak show run by Elijah C. Skuggs (Randy Quaid), who uses the fertilizer to create genetic freaks. There’s a good amount of spurting and obviously comic bodily fluids and obviously bad puns in the creation of the freaks. The real sell here are the ridiculous and comic effects (largely reminiscent of Killer Klowns from Outer Space) as well as the cast. This is loaded with B-level comic talent like Mr. T and Bobcat Goldthwait. It’s dumb as hell, but it’s hard not to find it a little charming.
Film: Matinee (1993)
A sort of homage to William Castle, Matinee takes place in Key West, Florida during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Shock filmmaker Lawrence Woolsey (John Goodman) is bringing his latest creation, monster film Mant, to shock people with its story of atomic radiation turning a man into a giant ant creature. Much of the film is told through the point of view of Gene Loomis (Simon Fenton), a Navy brat new to the area and obsessed with monster films. This is a love letter to the wacky science fiction films of the past, the sort of movies that came with gimmicks to get people into the theater. It’s hard not to love it as a slice of life, and I’ll be damned if I wouldn’t want to watch Mant as a double feature with the original version of The Fly or perhaps Them!.
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