That's Really Super

Film: Supergirl
Format: Streaming video from HBO on various sources.

Before we talk too much about Supergirl, we need to spend some time talking about the toxicity of nerd culture. If Supergirl had been a perfect superhero movie, something that rivaled the cultural relevance and power of Avengers: Endgame, there would have been a sizable contingent of nerds online rating it 1-star, sight unseen. Why? Because it’s a superhero movie with a female lead who isn’t entirely dependent on a male character or even in any kind of relationship with a male character. Wonder Woman got a pass because of Steve Rogers. Birds of Prey was downgraded because Harley Quinn escaped from the toxic influence of the Joker in that film. There are a lot of nerds who project their desperate desire for male dominance on all movies, and none so much as those they seem to think are theirs by divine right. Oh, and probably Supergirl isn’t hot enough for the standards of guys who haven’t touched a woman other than their own mother.

The truth is that Supergirl is not a perfect superhero movie. It’s not even the best DC superhero movie of the last few years. It is, however, at least very good, and presents a very interesting view on the title character. It also does this without a lot of the expected “Grrl power” attitude. In fact, for a good portion of the movie, Kara Zor-El/Supergirl (Milly Alcock) isn’t very likeable.

Hodl to the Moon

Film: Dumb Money
Format: DVD from DeKalb Public Library on basement television.

No one would ever mistake me for knowing anything much about money. My wife handles the bills because if it were up to me, I’d be late on a bunch of them. Everyone has their talents and mine don’t lie in that area. Because of this, movies like The Big Short tend to go a little over my head. I have to pay a lot of attention to keep up with financial stories because it’s just…beyond me. That makes me kind of the target market for a movie like Dumb Money because I am very much named in the title.

This movie is based on the story of GameStop. More specifically, this is about the GameStop stock explosion that happened during the pandemic. According to the film, and I honestly don’t know how much of this is actually real, a guy named Keith Gill (Paul Dano) noticed that some major investors were shorting GameStop, including hedge fund managers who put significant money into shorting the stock. As I understand it, shorting is basically a bet that the stock will tank—a future promise to buy the stock created by “selling” the stock now. If you “sell” the stock at $10 and it drops to $5, you’ve just made $5 per share. If you think the company is going under—and GameStop certainly looked like it was going to—you sell for whatever the price is and buy it for essentially zero. So Keith decided that the stock was undervalued and started telling people on the Wall Street Bets subreddit on Reddit.

Off Script: Fright Night (2011)

Films: Fright Night (2011)
Format: DVD from Rockford Public Library on The New Portable.

I was very much prepared to dislike the 2011 version of Fright Night for a number of reasons. The first and primary reason is that it’s a rare movie where I’m happy to see Colin Farrell in the cast list. He’s one of those actors I tend to think could be replaced by a lot of other people in most cases, and I say this as someone who has genuinely enjoyed some of his performances (like Minority Report). Part of this is that I love the original Fright Night for its campy joys and figured (rightly, mind you) that this would be a much darker film. Intentional camp is rarely good, which means that we’re going to either lose that aspect or we’re going to have a lot of forced silliness.

There are some things that work in the remake’s favor. It’s a reminder of just how much the cinematic world lost when we lost Anton Yelchin. Yelchin was almost always engaging on screen, and he certainly is here. We’re also going to get Toni Collette, who I will watch in virtually anything, even if she’s a bit underused in this film. We’ll also get David Tennant in the Roddy McDowell role, and while the two versions of Peter Vincent are very different, they both have their strengths.

I'm a Barbie Girl

Film: Lars and the Real Girl
Format: Streaming video from NetFlix on rockin’ flatscreen.

I’ve sat here with a Word document open for a few minutes wondering exactly how to approach Lars and the Real Girl. Anyone who hasn’t seen it and knows the story will understand that, as will most of the people who have seen it. It’s alternately a truly bizarre drama and a poignant comedy at times, despite the elevator pitch. Everything about Lars and the Real Girl screams that it will be trash comedy that manages not even a smile in all but the thickest cretins in the audience, and yet it’s actually an effective, even heartfelt film.

That elevator pitch makes this unlikely. Lars Lindstrom (Ryan Gosling) is an introverted loner living in the garage behind the house of his brother Gus (Paul Schneider) and Gus’s pregnant wife Karin (Emily Mortimer). Virtually all interactions with Lars are incredibly frustrating. He doesn’t like to be talked to or touched and always appears (and is) uncomfortable in all personal situations. This changes when Lars sends away for life-sized, presumably anatomically correct sex doll that he names Bianca (presumably played by herself).