Louis Theroux: Inside the Manosphere

 

★★★—Eh, it was fine. Following around a bunch of boring douchebags who constantly do and say outrageous/stupid things gets old super quick. The doc doesn’t really take these losers desperate for attention to task in a way that’s worth watch. I think this could have been done better. It gives these guys too much of a platform, doesn’t go at them hard enough. For the most part it implies people who give these dudes the time must be really lost… what they touch on briefly at the end is that the people that watch, and are being influenced, are children. So, yeah, fuck these guys. We get a glimpse of this disturbing, dangerous world, but it could have been more. 

Top 10 of 2025: 7. Jay Kelly

★★★★★--Movie about looking back after a lifetime of success and realizing you fucked up. Watched this the day before my sister’s wedding. A wedding I was officiating. Seemed like the best movie possible going into the occasion. 

George Clooney plays title character Jay Kelly, who is a famous actor much like George Clooney who also starred in all the same roles the real George Clooney starred in. Things get pretty meta. He is always wonderful, this maybe especially so. Noah Baumbach directs. Wrote it with Emily Mortimer who plays Jay Kelly’s hairstylist.

 

Rest of the cast is star-studded. Adam Sandler knocks it out of the park as Jay’s manager Ron. He has a wife back home, played by director Greta Gerwig (who is Baumbach’s real life wife), but he also has unresolved history with Jay's publicist Liz, played by the ageless Laura Dern. Billy Crudup is an actor/former friend of Jay’s that he screwed over to get his big break. Elvis’s granddaughter Riley Keough is Jessica Kelly, Jay's elder daughter, while Grace Edwards is Daisy Kelly, Jay's younger daughter who he did a little bit better of a job raising. Stacy Keach plays Jay’s dad. And Patrick Wilson plays actor Ben Alcock who is also an A-lister managed by Ron but is not quite on Jay’s level of stardom.

 

While I loved it, it kind of lost me in the last 30 minutes before correcting course to stick the landing. This wonderful meditation on aging, legacy, power, perception, family, stardom, celebrity, celebrity worship, friendship, brotherhood, betrayal, and guilt. Yeah, it’s pretty great.

31 Days of Halloween: Samara Weaving Night: The Babysitter: Killer Queen -- A Bloody Return to Culty Chaos

The Babysitter: Killer Queen - McG – 2020

 

★★★-Day 7 of the Nightmare on Film Street 31 Days of Halloween Horror Challenge. Samara Weaving night. Don’t mind if I do. 

A horror-comedy sequel to The Babysitter, picking up two years after the pre-pubescent star survives a satanic cult led by his babysitter. He must once again fight for his life when the cult he Home Aloned to death returns for revenge, still after his virgin blood.

 

Starts with the survivor virgin dude from the first one (a youngan named Judah Lewis) being pretty much a pariah with his little girlfriend, played by Emily Alyn Lind (she was Snakebite Andi in Doctor Sleep), now with the school’s jocky douche. You'll probably also recognize Ken Marino from Party Down and Wet Hot American Summer and Leslie Bibb from Trick 'r Treat and Talladega Nights. They were in the first movie with slightly bigger parts as the parents of the protagonist.

 

Directed by McG. He did several movies in the aughts that no one cared for. Charlie's Angels movies, We Are Marshall, Terminator Salvation (that’s the one where Christian Bale lost his shit on the director of photography). These Babysitter flicks are dope though.

 

More brutal than the original (decapitations, spontaneous combustions, death by propeller, so forth), this one also has its share of humor. Like trying to bone so he isn’t so pure they want to kill him and what not.

 

I have trouble telling Lind apart from Kathryn Newton and Rose McIver. In this flick, she is also consciously trying to resemble Samara Weaving, who herself looks a lot like Margot Robbie. They are all very beautiful women, but sort of out of hot blonde central casting. There is a pretty sweet Ortega vs. Lind Gen Z “it girl” off at the end. I liked it. But less than the first one. Still waiting on that third one, though. 

David Fincher's 'The Killer': An Existential Masterpiece in the Shadows of Noir

The Killer - David Fincher - 2023

David Fincher is my favorite filmmaker. Every time he makes a movie, it is a gift. This one, especially so. Earlier this year, I said that Oppenheimer was the best movie to come out in my lifetime. Well, it might be the best film of the year, but I'm pretty sure The Killer is my favorite. By the way, this surpasses 2007 as the best film year I've been cognizant of, and these two pictures give me a No Country for Old Men vs. There Will Be Blood vibe. Yeah, that movie that won all the awards was dope, but the other was the best movie of the decade. I'm going on record; it's the kind of film that gets the Academy's attention, doesn't win shit, then years later, everyone collectively realizes it's a classic. We shall see come awards season. 

Based on the French graphic novel series The Killer written by Alexis "Matz" Nolent and illustrated by Luc Jacamon. Stars Michael Fassbender as the hitman, also Arliss Howard (who I love), Charles Parnell, Kerry O'Malley, Sala Baker, Sophie Charlotte, and Tilda Swinton. This is the second of four movies Fincher is making for Netflix. The first was Mank, released in 2020. 

The gist: a hitman finds himself in some shit after botching a hit. He's now playing cat and mouse with his former bosses (and himself), who nearly killed his girlfriend trying to get to him. So "nothing like this can ever happen again," he goes on the offensive, globe-trotting, ducking in and out of shadows, insisting that what he's doing isn't personal. Yeah, sure. 

It's this guy's version of self-help. You know, throw yourself in your work, meditate, do some yoga, tell yourself lies, take up existential philosophy, quote some Aleister Crowley (I named a rooster Aleister Crowley, no shit), listen to the Smiths, shoot a guy in the face. Just like mine, except with extreme violence. (I have said verbatim several things this guy says through the course of this film, but never really considered myself a psycho).

The world portrayed is in no way glamorous. This world is cold. The film opens with him prepping for a kill, which is all just mundane shit, part of his day. People that come for you have no names or faces. You don't know who they are, and they don't know you. But that bullet still has your name on it. People don't understand why he is there when he shows up to do his deeds. 

This isn't just run-of-the-mill action. The one choreographed fight scene is fucking brutal, all out, and devastating. As Fassbender walks away, he repeats one of his mantras, "This is what it takes." He's saying this to us, the audience. Fuck.

First watch, I thought it was a masterpiece, but it was a mid-tier Fincher. Now, I have it fourth and rising. Zodiac, Se7en, and Social Network ahead of it. But just barely. Surpasses Gone Girl and Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, another of his misunderstood home runs. 

Made me think of Paul Schrader whose work also depicts troubled men struggling through an existential crisis leading to a violent, cathartic event. If you don't know who he is, he's the guy who wrote Taxi Driver and Raging Bull and directed the films  Cat People, Affliction, Auto Focus, The Canyons (the insane Bret Easton Ellis written film staring Lindsay Lohan and porn actor/rapist James Deen who was called "Bill Cosby of porn"), and most recently The Constant Gardner. He got into some shit after the 2016 election for calling the upcoming Trump presidency "a call to violence" and that "we should be willing to take arms. Like Old John Brown." Such earned him a visit from the NYC Counterterrorism Bureau. So that's pretty cool. 

Looked to see if he had anything to say about it. He did. "Is style its own validation in narrative art? Or should it serve another purpose as well? Fincher's film is a masterclass in film style, but there is a pharase (sic) for this in Texas. It's called 'all hat.'" He also called Fassbender's character "the Chatty-Kathy of hit men."

Fincher himself called it a "B-movie." A dressed-up, near-silent assassin film that's sharp, pulpy, and doesn't pretend. Style, cynical worldviews, pessimism, these are things Fincher films ooze. The images of the various nocturnal cities suggest a Dostoevsky nightmare, fragments of artistic tradition to stave off spiritual despair, laden with new-wave references to other movies and directors. nostalgia is very much in Fincher's mind. Fincher gives us many allusions (most notably Le Samourai by Jean-Pierre Melville). Throughout, unorthodox narration (very much a noir trope) demonstrates the ambiguity of human motives. Commodity culture is a wasteland (product placement is everywhere, making his job both easier to perform and harder to get away with). The film is a critical and self-reflexive analysis of contemporary life, a dream image of bygone glamour repressing as much history as it recalls and service of the cinephile and commodification.

Asked several people what they thought this movie was about and got completely different answers, which were also different from mine. That's what makes Fincher a genius. It's different based on where you are and what you're dealing with. For me, it was obviously about the fallacy of control and the lies we tell ourselves. Also, a meditation on what it takes to be great. Also, why give a shit enough for those sacrifices. This is where the existentialist fires up.

"Fate is a placebo," he says at the end. "The only life path is the one behind you." Then he flenches when he says he is one of the many, just like us, the audience. That shit isn't going to last. This whole time, the killer is a political pessimist experiencing existential anguish, erasing his old life and taking up this new one that is the antithesis of everything he says and does. However, he is the ultimate unreliable narrator. At the end, you see a man expressing a passion for the past and present but also a fear of the future. Dreads looking ahead instead tries to survive by the day and, when unsuccessful, retreats into the past, i.e., its erasure. He is one with a lack of clear priorities, experiencing his first taste of insecurity. So he concentrates on violence, perversion, and decay, what he knows. His cauldron of inarticulate rage we get through his noir-like offscreen narration that's highly poetic and ironic, reinforced by his protection and love that we don't see and is likely bullshit. This love, who is stuck with at the movie's end, has destroyed his real identity. Ideologically, deep down, he is a contradiction, and all his talk incoherent. 

Yes, if you can't tell, I love existential art and film noir. A character withdrawing into despair and bitter disengagement that's my jam. Couple that with an atmosphere of determinism and irony, irredeemable evil, exposing the underside of American character, then I am rock hard. "I. Don't. Give. A. Fuck." 

Johnny Eight-ball had one thing on his mind during his time in the NFL... It wasn't winning football games

Untold: Johnny Football - Ryan Duffy - 2023

This Netflix documentary has really taken the world by storm. Presents a side of the life and career of Johnny Manziel, Heisman Trophy winner and NFL bust Johnny Football (later Johnny 8-ball) that's about as sensational as it gets. The documentary delves into the unraveling of Manziel's football career in astounding and jaw-dropping fashion. Like his time in the show, these revelations prove extremely captivating.

One of the personal favorites is the scheme devised by Manziel's agent, Erik Burkhardt. to get his client through the NFL Combine before the draft that included a drug test that Manziel had no chance at passing. The plan went thus: Manziel would arrive in Indianapolis, the location of the combine, demonstrating his commitment to the NFL process. Prior to interviews and drug tests, Manziel's father would simulate a heart attack, prompting Manziel to fly back home to be with his family. During his time at home, he would cleanse his system and then reschedule private interviews with NFL teams, creating the image of family man who gave a shit. 

Maybe the craziest revelation though was that Manziel never watched any game film throughout his career. I played Division III college football for a truly terrible team. We watched anywhere from one to three hours of film nearly every day. We watched practices, games, games of upcoming teams, so forth. It was part of the experience, like stretching. I can't really fathom how someone could get away with that. 

Some other bombshells include a casual admission of a fourth-string quarterback taking drug tests on Manziel's behalf during his college days at Texas A&M. He was also signing autographs for money and getting cash under the table from boosters, which cost Reggie Bush his Heisman Trophy. There is also a bit about arranging a private workout for Manziel, during which his receivers were out all night doing coke with the star QB and missed the workout. As such, Manziel's semi-athletic agent stepped in to catch passes, which also defies belief. 

I could only assume the fallout from the documentary is going to be substantial. On a related note, I loved this doc! Dude does seem like a fun hang. 

Arnold - 2023

In The Last Dance territory for personal propaganda, but it doesn't shy away from Arnold's faults. Sort of nice to see people like this owning up to the mistakes they've made instead of denying and calling out fake news. However, it does paint these faults in the most flattering light possible. 

This is Arnold's victory lap, after all. It's a heavily produced miniseries that primarily caters to dedicated fans. One of my favorite takes, from one Simon Abrams on RogerEbert.com reads:

“Schwarzenegger cocks a schticky eyebrow and puffs on evenly-lit cigars while admiring coffee table-sized books filled with high-resolution photos of himself from over the years.”

Oof. 

So, yeah, while he shares PR-friendly perspectives on various aspects of his public life, including engaging in an extramarital affair, notable omissions include any mention of his abusive father's voluntary involvement with the Nazis or how he was something of a, uh, Hitler enthusiast himself for a time. 

I've dealt with enough rich, famous people to know that a lot of them can be quite unpleasant. Arnold seems like he'd be an alright hang, but I don't think you'd really be having a conversation, if you know what I mean.

You have to expect that a little with people like this, minus the Nazi stuff, who worked their way up to the top of the world. They all have a competition in them that drives them. Arnold probably more than most. And he stays charming, at least. Plus he likes animals and is mostly vegan now. Which is dope. But I'm sure he's still an asshole. 

Untold: Operation Flagrant Foul

Nice, interesting 30 for 30 style Netflix doc on the Tim Donaghy scandal. Donaghy was the NBA referee illegally gambling and influencing the outcomes of games. Tells how through his connections to organized crime, Donaghy made calls to benefit the gamblers he was associated with to cover spreads and what not. 

At one point Donaghy talked about how they'd get told by the league, handed down by Commissioner David Stern, known Indiana Pacer/small market hater, that they need to start calling more of this or that. Carrying or traveling on a certain spin move Jordan was fond of, for example. But when he makes one of those violation on His Airness, unquestionably the greatest player to ever play the game of basketball, Bulls Coach Phil Jackson tells him how it is:

“I started to understand what's within the game in the NBA. I was in Philadelphia and I am refereeing Sixers-Bulls. They were cracking down on the spin move that they wanted the officials to call traveling. Michael Jordan makes the spin move, I make the call. Phil Jackson comes off the bench and he starts giving me shit. I say, 'wait a second, Phil. You know as well as I do that's the spin move they're telling us to call.' And he said, 'while they might want that play called, they certainly don't want it called on him', and he pointed at Jordan who just walked by and stared at me. I got in the locker room, the other referee said, 'they want that call but don't want to on him.”

Yeah, indeed, it is a superstars league and they are treated accordingly. This of course brings into question the fairness of NBA games.

This is further evidence to the conspiracy theory that the NBA was more or less rigged under Stern in favor of the biggest markets and the players that sell the most jersey and if you are Michael Jordan, you get every call. You hear people talk about how when Jordan played the game was so much more physical. That's bullshit. Watch one of those games and you'll see Jordan get every goddamn call. “But the hand check rule!” You hand-check Jordan, you got a foul. Such is the case with all the super-stars. Look at the all time attempts list (Jordan is 11th, by the by). It's big guys who played forever (the Mailman, Wilt, Shaq Moses Malone, Dwight Howard, Kareem) like you'd expect and the guys that NBA protects (LeBron, Kobe, Jordan) with the exceptions of maybe the guys who played in the 60s/70s (Oscar Robertson, Jerry West), I can't say much with confidence about that era. In the playoffs, it is way worse. Jordan is tied for third with Tim Duncan. LeBron with over 100 more games than Jordan is first, he has also got nearly every call throughout his career, with Hack-a-Shaq at number two. The guys ahead of him all have way over 200 playoff games under their belts. Jordan had 179. As far as average per game, among players with 100 playoff games or more, Jordan is third in per game average, behind liabilities Shaq and Wilt.

All this is to say the Pacers should have won game seven of the Eastern Conference Finals in 1998! Small markets Utah vs. Indiana? Nah. Stern was never going to let that happen. This was how it was for most teams that were in cities that don't matter or didn't have one of the three best players in the league.

Anyway, so Donaghy was guilty as shit. Pled guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and transmitting betting information through interstate commerce. Okay. In the doc he admits to providing confidential information about games to the other two guys involved in the scheme, quasi mafia guys Jimmy Battista and Tommy Martino who he went to high school with in Pennsylvania. They all plead guilty, served at least a year in federal prison, and now hate each other. They all also participated in the documentary. 

Not the first of these Netflix Untold docs I've watched. They are worth watching if you like that type of story off the field type stuff, which I fucking love. One of particular interest is how Stern screwed over the Pacers after the Malice in the Palace when Ron Artest went into the stands and started swinging after fan John Green hit him in the face with a beer which caused a riot. Stern suspended the fuck out of my team including Artest for life which was later commuted to the rest of the season. This still makes me mad. Other NBA players that got suspended for a whole season include Latrell Sprewell for choking his coach and threatening him with death, Gilbert Arenas for pulling a gun on a teammate in the locker room. Even they didn't get a lifetime to start with though. 

Running with the Devil: The Wild World of John McAfee

Running with the Devil: The Wild World of John McAfee - Two Stars 

Charlie Russell 

2022 

From watching this documentary, which is entertaining, you never know that McAfee was a piece of shit rapist. The whole murderer he’s accused of is also painted in a very sympathetic light. If somebody poisoned my dog, I’d probably fucking kill that dude too, but the gist of this movie is he probably didn’t do it, if he did he was justified, and in the end who cares. 

Every other documentary I’ve seen about this guy, the famous Gringo one from 2016 and several others on YouTube, leads me to think this guy was a huge piece of shit.  I’ve long been on the fuck that guy train. That this movie is pro McAfee is pretty problematic and likely non-factual. 

Spoiler. At the end of the movie McAfee’s ex girlfriend, Samantha Herrera, says that she got a call from him a couple weeks after he was found dead and that he wanted her to run away with him. Since then, she has said in interviews, “What I said was I got a call from Texas from someone saying it was John, who said he was still alive in Spain. I told the film’s makers that I didn’t know if it was him or someone posing as him. I said that on film, but it wasn’t used.”

The Privilege was the okayest movie of all time

The Privilege. Directed by Felix Fuchssteiner and Katharina Schöde. From 2022. On Netflix.

Interesting German horror movie about multi-generational wealth and the shit that gets passed down when you make a shit ton of money off of oppressing others and being cool with demons. Thought they were going to touch on German guilt over the whole Nazi thing but they don’t.

Gist of the movie consists of a wealthy high school kid starts uncovering some weird conspiracy and everyone acts like is going crazy. Meanwhile he is getting crazy drugs for a past traumatic event. The wealthy parents and his twin sister are constantly gaslighting him. “You didn’t see what you think you did,” “your friend committed suicide in a most unlikely way,” “if it was a murder though, you probably did it,” so forth.

Something I found cool was this “drug” they are testing on kids, another thing they could’ve connected to the Nazi shit, ends up being a psilocybin-rich thread fungus. Ends up being an extinct mushroom that grows on dead human remains. Pretty cool. There’s also this cool hallucinogen expert lady that I dig. Has a gypsy Betty Buckley with Alia Shawkat vibe. My kind of lady.

Also love the séance scene. Parents leave so their son can bone the check he likes who came over to study biology, ugh. They practically beg him to have sex with her. Pretty weird. Then they come home super early unexpectedly in the middle of the ritual. Which freaks them out way more than their son raw dogging his little high school girlfriend or whatever.

Follow that up with another real WTF moment. One of those “what if this is the last night of our lives” threesomes between the main dude, his girlfriend, and his lesbian friend. Alright.

Lot of body horror and various homages. Scanners, The Stuff, The Others, Get Out, Hereditary.

Gets a little hard to follow. Little too ambitious. Would’ve been better dial back a little bit. It’s not bad but not great either. Plus the very and was super dumb. Set it up for a sequel that is completely unnecessary.

Choose or Die is the greatest movie of all time

Choose or Die. "I don't see how a video game can kill someone. I mean Pac-Man doesn't go around eating people." Directed by Toby Meakins. Released in 2022 on Netflix. 

I really enjoyed this poorly reviewed flick. A lot of those controlling a player from a game from the 80s movies. Interesting premise. One of several old games coming to phone movies. How many Jumanji knock-offs can there be? Don’t know, assume we are about at the peak here, but I’m a total sucker for them.

Only people I recognize are Asa Butterfield from Sex Education, Iola Evans (the star of the movie) from The 100, and Eddie Marsan from The World's End (among other things). We also hear Robert Englund who lends his voice to the film as himself. 

Picture was so dark I could barely see it at times. Even with the picture all the way up on the darker scenes I could barely see anything.

There’s some real moments in this movie. There’s a scary-ass rat scene where the main girl controls her mom like in a video game. Eerie industrial music heightens the suspense. 

Sort of falls apart briefly when they put it in a “cheat code”. Hey, it’s still winning in my book. Some games, like Mike Tyson’s Punch Out, were impossible without a cheat code. But it completely rebounds during the “Boss Battle”. It’s a truly amazing scene. It’s seriously dope.

Ending sets up at sequel that I would totally watch.

Secret Obsession is the worst movie of all time

Secret Obsession. "What happened? How did I get here?" "You were in an accident, and you hit your head. You don't remember me, do you?" Awful all the way around. Basically a Lifetime quality movie. Feel that it mostly consisted of the main actress unconvincingly limping around. It's rotten as fuck. 

Rotten Tomato Consensus: While it may offer some thrills and unintentional laughs, Secret Obsession is mostly a formulaic and dumb thriller.

Released in 2019 on Netflix, the gist of the movie is a woman suffers a head injury when she is hit by a car. She can't remember shit, but her creepy husband is there to help her put the pieces back together. But she has this suspicious that she is still in danger. There are a couple of parts that made me LOL, but I assure you they are unintentional--again with the limping around and once when an actress is running away from a dude, and has basically gotten away but falls down the stairs out of nowhere.

Directed by one Peter Sullivan, a guy who indeed specializes in Lifetime and Hallmark movies with mostly Christmas flicks to his name. It stars Brenda Song, whom I've never seen, in the lead role. Mike Vogel who you might recognize from Cloverfield plays her husband. A woman named Ashley Scott who looks hella familiar plays the nurse helping the amnisiac recover. Her biggest credits include the show Jericho, a sex robot in A.I. Artificial Intelligence (one of the worst Steven Spielberg movies), Into the Blue, and some show I've never heard of called Birds of Prey. The only person I really recognized is Dennis Haysbert. He is the black guy that played President David Palmer on 24 and Pedro Cerrano in Major League. However, you probably most know him as the "you're in good hands with Allstate" guy. He goes about investigating the accident in an uninteresting way, motivated by his dead daughter somehow? 

This is a film that asks, can two injured people take on one able-bodied man? Also, how many scrambled eggs can a woman eat in one sitting? This came recommended from someone with dubious taste. I feel this is the most basic movie I've ever seen. Easy, generic plot that a high school kid could have come up with. Acting is mostly screaming and limping around or looking like an asshole. Did not like. 

Vampires vs. the Bronx is the greatest film of all time

Yo, check out the courthouse. They are turning it into apartments. You know how this starts. White people with canvas bags. That is always the first sign. Pretty solid flick. Had some Attack the Block vibes. Not quite as good though. Sort of falls apart a little at the end. Still really fun though. For sure recommend this new flick available to stream on Netflix now. 

Rotten Tomato Consensus: In the sharp, socially conscious battle of Vampires vs. the Bronx, comedy and horror blend brilliantly -- and the audience is the winner.

Gist is that a group of kids from the Bronx fight to save their neighborhood from vampires that are moving in and trying to gentrify their block. Pretty solid social commentary as well as a comedy horror movie. 

Directed by one Osmany Rodriguez. Looks to have done a lot of TV and shorts, but this one of his first, if not the first, feature film. He also wrote it with another guy. Mostly follows around three dudes that are 15ish. Playing these parts are Jaden Michael, Gerald W. Jones III, and Gregory Diaz IV. I've seen none of them but they are all great. Also in their crew is one Coco Jones, who is female. All of the acting is pretty great. 

Other's you'd recognize include Sarah Gadon who plays the head vampire. I mostly know her from the Stephen King adaptation of 11.22.63. She plays the role of Sadie Dunhill, the female lead. She's a pretty lady. Method Man, who plays a no-nonsense priest. Chris Redd, who is just some dude on the block. And a vampire or two sort of stick out. 

Like I said, sort of falls apart at the end. The head vampire chick is like 700 years old and brags about how she is the shit and all. However, she makes a bunch of rookie mistakes that end up getting her killed. Ends sort of on a, "well, that ended up being pretty easy," which was kinda weak. 

Gotta give the MVP to the three kids. They are pretty perfect and totally great as buds. Really fun movie that henges on their roles. Even though the ending is weak, they always shine. 

True Crime: Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich is the greatest movie of all time

Were you ever sent three 12-year-old girls to sexually abuse as a birthday gift? I’d like to answer that question. But today I’m gonna have to assert my Sixth Amendment rights, my Fifth Amendment rights. Is it true that you forced Virgina Roberts to have sex with numerous friends of yours? Are you kidding? I assert my Sixth Amendment rights, my Fifth Amendment rights. 

Rotten Tomato Consensus: It lacks new insight, but by focusing on the stories of survivors Filthy Rich sheds light on the lasting impact of Epstein's crimes.

This mother fucker. Really effective doc. Epstien had a sexual abuse pyramid scheme going, got caught, should have gone away forever, and was given a slap on the wrist by a fucking douchbag who eventually got promoted into Trump's cabinet. This Alex Acosta prick. Fucking incredible. I totally want to murder this dude and Epstein and a bunch of other people based on this shit. Probably most of all Alan Dershowitz. 

One of the women, this Virginia Roberts, now Giuffre, has repeatedly said that Dershowitz had sex with her when she was underage. His move is to say she won't go on record because she is afraid of committing lible but that is bullshit.

In this doc fucking prick makes the statement "I challenge Virginia Roberts to come on your show, look in the camera and say the following words: 'I accuse Alan Dershowitz of having had sex with me on six or seven occasions.' She has never been willing to accuse me in public, so please accuse me on this show. I challenge you." 

Immediately cut to her saying "I was with Alan Dershowitz multiple times. At least six that I can remember. I was trafficked to Alan Dershowitz from Epstein... He's denied being with me. Is one of us telling the truth? Yes. Is that person me? Yes." 

He said the same shit in this New Yorker article from last year, "Alan Dershowitz, Devil's Avocate." It's his game to make you think she is lying or whatever. Fuck him. This article also makes the case that Dershowitz wasn't that great of a lawyer either. He was mostly hyped by himself and powerful friends. No F. Lee Bailey, for example. Again, fuck him. Great read by the way, the New Yorker piece. 

Gist of the doc is that the survivors of Epstein's sexual abuse/statutory rape/straight up rape reveal how they were manipulated and abuse by the billionaire who kept buying his way out of trouble. All of them were emotionally scarred and suffered greatly. Their stories are powerful and moving and gut wrenching. A must watch, but be prepared to be outraged. 

Also, something that wasn't in the documentary, just an FYI... Q: "Have you ever socialized with Donald Trump in the presence of females under the age of 18?" A: "Though I'd like to answer that question, at least today I'm going to have to assert my Fifth, Sixth, and 14th Amendment rights, sir." How's that for making your blood boil. And, to be fair, he hung out with Bill Clinton, too, who has lied about it. Though no one is claiming they were forced to bone ole' Slick Willy. 

After watching the American Murderer: The Family Next Door, Epstein didn't seem so bad for about a minute and a half, which is fucked. Then you see the devastation and hear what these women went through again and again. Fuck. Never the same. These dudes are the fucking worst. 

True Crime: American Murder: The Family Next Door is the greatest film of all time

Shanann, if you are seeing this, just come back. This mother fucker. Netflix true crime documentary about Chris Watts killing his wife Shanann and their two children. Fuck. Made me sick to my stomach. Kills the wife and kids and goes to work, stashing their remains at the site. Wife's BFF though has the police at his house before he even gets off work. And in case the cop that shows up at the scene is some kind of idiot (which seemed likely), a neighbor of Watts tells the cop that dude "isn't acting right." These two are fucking heroes. 

Does it to be with his mistress, who looks a whole lot like his wife. My dude has a type. He definitely likes a brunette that sort of walks all over him, that's for sure. Except one is all, "be a better husband" and "fuck me," while the other is all "kill your family." That isn't confirmed, but that mistress seems fucking evil, like she was hiding her involvement. But that is conjecture and she never had her day in court or anything. Regardless, dude seemed completely possessed by his infatuation for this mistress and def killed to be with her. Dude is definitely evil as fuck. Mistress, probably. She is hotter, but loses a lot of points for being really uncool. 

Really well done documentary. Follows the story from the very beginning through the confession and trial. All with actual footage from body cameras, security cams, and the news. Also get texts and social media posts involving the victims, giving them a voice. However, again, made me a little sick to my stomach. It's not quite as heart-wrenching as Dear Zachary, but it's in the ballpark. It's not like he is super compelling or anything either, like with Robert Durst. Great, but never watching again. 

Murder Mystery is the greatest movie of all time

Murder Mystery.  Part of this whole Adam Sandler is cool again thing from Netflix. I like it and I dug the movie. Right in my wheelhouse. Love Agatha Christie. Love a whodunit that doesn't take itself seriously. Been on a big Adam Sandler kick. Totally my schtick. With that in mind, not too surprising that I would think that it was the greatest movie of all time... And here we are. Critics hated it for the most part but I enjoyed it even though Sandler's character was sort of schmuck and Aniston is finally starting to age, though she still looks great (if a little white trashy, which I assume was intentional).

Rotten Tomato Consensus: Murder Mystery reunites Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler for a lightweight comedy that's content to settle for merely mediocre.

The first 20 minutes of the movie are a depressing mess with Aniston and Sandler's characters, who are married, sort of getting into it because Sandler doesn't do anything and is like the stereotypical embarrassing lazy, generic romcom dude. They've been married for 15 years and he still hasn't taken her on their promised European honeymoon because he is not only lazy, he is also cheap... and a liar. He tells her has had a promotion to detective but he is really just a cop. All this is sad and dumb.

Also, there is a character that plays this Maharishi or some such shit, that uses his spirituality and status as a guru to get laid. There is a term for this in Hinduism I remember learning in Intro to Religion freshman year of college but can't recall it anymore. It's real bad when it comes to rebirth as this is super fucking low but obviously pretty fucking common. This character, played by one Adeel Akhtar who is in that canceled Fox show Ghosted and was one of the terrorists in the mockumentary Four Lions. This guy. Not sure if I fucking hate the shit out of this character or not. He has his moments when I do, that's for fucking sure, but overall, I think I don't know what to think.

But then we get on the plane and Aniston meets some rich dude played by one Luke Evans--a handsome guy whom I only recognize from The Hobbit movies and was apparently in that new horror flick Ma which I haven't gotten around to seeing yet--when she sneaks into first class. He owns the airline or his uncle (Terence Stamp) does or something and befriends the two, inviting them to this shit show yacht trip with all these rich celebrities and shit that his dad is about to disown and announce he is leaving everything to his young wife who was once engaged to Evans. Right before signing his will, though, the lights go out and he gets got. Next thing we know people are dying all over the place.

The movie is at its best when Aniston and Sandler (I feel he wins the movie) ham it up as idiot Americans just along for the ride. They are ridiculously out of place for everything except the last 10 minutes of the movie. They dress like assholes, say dumb shit, and just look like classless idiots. Best with this is when Stamp's character goes through his relationship with all the people he is cutting off, saying shit like, "I gave you a career in film," "you saved my life in a suicide bombing assassination attempt 30 years ago," "you have led my race team to however many Formula One Championships," and so forth. When he sees them and is all, WTF are these idiots doing here. Evans character insists they stay, the rich dude is like, fine, I don't care, I do not care, you are all cut off. He, again, stabbed to death, and we get some solid physical humor with the general guy that saved him from assassination pulling out the knife. Sandler is like, probably want to leave that where it is, and he stabs it into the dead guy again. Hilarious.

I mean, the movie is what it is. If you liked shit like Woody Allen's Manhattan Murder Mystery, which I fucking love, then this is your fucking jam. Not into Murder on the Orient Express or And Then There Were None? First off, what the fuck, man? And second, you're not going to like this shit.

The Ritual is the greatest movie of all time

The Ritual. Netflix original. Brittish film. Based on a book of the same name. Imagine it works pretty well as a book. But who the fuck has time for that. Genuinely pretty scary in a slow burn sort of way at first and then in a completely different way at the end. In more of an awed "oh shit" way at the end. So completely different levels; both work equally well in this flick. We get isolation, witchcraft, cults, a terrifying creature. Plus it's a pretty good fucked up male friendship movie. A lot like Deliverance and The Blair Witch Project with a bigger budget and better effects. Great little flick, this movie. Greatest film of all time even.

Rotten Tomato Consensus: Director David Bruckner makes evocative use of the Scandinavian setting and a dedicated cast to deliver a handsome -- if familiar -- horror story.

Pros: Pretty solid tension. A lot going on but it all comes together and makes sense in the end. Does a good job of putting us there with the group by presenting various mysteries and such that we figure out with the hikers. The creature at the end is dope AF and completely original/unexpected.

Cons: I've read some pretty polarizing takes on the end. I thought it was solid minus the way they creature treats the survivor dude which I'll get to below. Have a little weirdness in there for what feels like it's own sake that they don't explain at all.

Gist of the thing... Also, since this is newer, spoilers. Four buddies (with what appears to be no hiking experience) get together for a multiple day hike in backwoods Sweden after the fifth among them, Robert (Paul Reid) was killed in a robbery gone bad. One of them, Luke played by Rafe Spall (he was the guy that got his arm broke by the worm in Prometheus and was Yann Martel in Life of Pi [shout out to my cat, Richard Parker]), was present for the killing and there are lot of bad vibes among them based on the guy not doing more, both from the group and his own guilt. Whilst on the trip they discover some unsettling shit that should have sent them right back from whence they came before spending the night in a creepy house with some obvious cult stuff going on in it. From there they are stalked by some sort of forest creature and picked off one by one until two of them, Luke and Dom played by Sam Troughton whom no idea, survive. Those two end up in a rural community that worships the creature that ends up being part Norse deity.

Staring in the film are Spall and Troughton as Luke and Dom (who is the biggest bitch I've ever seen) respectively, with Arsher Ali (who was one of the main tourists, Hassan, in Four Lions) as Phil and Robert James-Collier (who looks like a sexy Jaime Lannister that was in Downton Abbey, which I hear is popular) as Hutch rounding out the last of the group. The was directed by a seemingly up and coming director in David Bruckner who previously worked on segments for the anthology films Southbound and V/H/S and previously directed a film called SiREN which I haven't seen but is supposed to be solid.

It's a pretty good premise, this movie. I liked the way the movie flowed as you go farther and farther from where you'd think this movie would take you. At first it seems like an isolated in the woods movie. Then a cult movie. Then a Predator type movie. Then a torture porn type movie. And, finally, an insanely cool monster movie... And all of it worked. Plus the monster looks and is amazing. More on that later as it is definitely the MVP of the flick.

Best quote of the movie comes from good old worthless Dom. Early in the movie when one of the dudes wants to take a shortcut, he says "My old scoutmaster used to say 'If the shortcut was a shortcut, it wouldn't be called a shortcut, it would be called a route'." Words to live by right there.

All the kills are more or less the same. Only difference is that in some of them we see the creature and in others we don't. Best of these, I'd say, is probably the one we see full frontal at the end when the village is burning down. Luke, having escaped and set fire to everything, including these little human avatar things in the attic that are unexplained and creepy as shit, watches it from afar. This lady bows down to worship the god, an act that usually saves them, but in this case the demigod lifts the her up with his little arms and gently impales her on a tree and we see it. All it's terrifying and awful glory.

Favorite scene of the movie is at the very end when survivor dude Luke is out in the woods with the monster. The monster, actually half Norse god, is keeps trying to force Luke to worship him which is a bit petty for a god but whatever. It keeps forcing him down on his hands and knees but Luke keeps getting up and fighting it which is pretty much suicidal. This keeps happening until Luke gets a weapon, an ax, and attacks the thing, pissing it off. But it buys him enough time to separate himself from the god and gets to the outskirt of the forest which the god cannot cross into. Luke, triumphant after just besting a fucking god, is fucking amped. Screaming at it all like fuck yeah. After all the shit he has been through it is pretty satisfying, intense scene.

MVP is 100%, as stated, the monster which is not a monster at all but the child of Norse mythological's Loki. First decent look we get at the thing is when the insufferable Dom is tied up, on a stake as an offering to the demigod, and he has a vision that his wife has come up to the camp looking for him. He is all, "what the hell" and she is sweet to him and stuff. But then, suddenly, it's not the wife but this truly horrifying thing (we don't get 100% clean shot here yet). And it does the thing and that's the end of Dom. It is creepy as shit, Dom is tied up on the little stake thing, thinking he is fucked with all the village people down in a prayer type position. He is simultaneously incredulous and terrified when suddenly his wife shows up. He relaxes and is like, "what are you doing here?" She grabs his face and acts sort of sweet to him when he sees that this is actually the monster or whatever and starts screaming. It is fucked and terrifying. It then picks him up and kills him. Picking him up and impaling him on a tree. And we still don't know what the fuck.

If you want a solid explanation of the mythology behind the demigod, this Forbes article is pretty thorough. Below is probably the most pertinent section:  

Characters in Norse mythology tend to shapeshift with alarming frequency, and the only defining trait of the jötunn seems to be that they are enemies of the gods. But not always. 

Either way, the beast is also described as the spawn of Loki, which is interesting in itself, as the Loki in Norse mythology is way more intense than Tom Hiddleston. The real Loki is completely chaotic - a malicious, mischievous, shape-shifting trickster who sometimes plays the hero, often the villain, and usually, is just messing with the nature of reality. 

Loki fathered a menagerie of nightmarish creatures - his children include Fenrir, the monstrous wolf that is destined to devour Odin during the apocalyptic battle of Ragnarok, Hel, the half-rotting goddess of the Underworld, and Jormungand, the Midgard Serpent, which is long enough to wrap itself around the world and bite its own tail.

Mindhorn is the greatest movie of all time

Fuck, Mindhorn, or "Brain Thorn" as my female companion calls it, is dope. Just my type of movie... so weird. This out there premise involves one Richard Thorncroft (Julian Barratt who was the main guy in The Mighty Boosh and was also in a few episodes of Garth Marenghi's Darkplace [do yourself a favor and watch that shit]) who was famous for a long forgotten fictitious television show on the Ilse of Man called Mindhorn. Long after burning all the bridges he's had in the entertainment business, Thorncroft returns to the island when a mentally disturbed young man sends him evidence of a murder, believing his character of Detective Mindhorn to be a real investigator who solves crimes with the help of a cybernetic eye that allows him to see the truth. This movie is amazing.

Last week while having dinner with friends at Falafels, we were all talking about movies and my female companion and I hyped Mindhorn up big time. Explaining it, the companion mentioned the Ilse of Man. This older guy eating there with his daughter and her boyfriend, overheard us and came over stoked, saying that he teaches there every other year in the summer, and asked if we had been there or something. Nope, just watched this ridiculous movie which you should totally watch. The dude seemed intrigued. The boyfriend, meanwhile, looked at us like he knew. But whatever. I hope he watches it as everyone should since it is the greatest movie of all time™ and all.

Pros: Super camp. Good pacing and humor. Interesting locale. Made me nostalgic for a show and place I've never seen. Again with the ridiculous cameos.

Cons: It is out there. There are a few times where it is hard to follow along.

I'd totes check this show out

Notes: While this movie is a totally odd comedy, it is also sort of a bummer of a movie. No one knows him anymore but he still thinks he can turn it all around. You have a guy that gambled on life and lost, taking his friends and people that depended on him along with him. As a result he is forced to find work in a bastardized perversion of his trade. Ironic punishment is a mother fucker, yo.

Some stuff I liked about this were the absurdity of it, the cameos, and the male lead. Whenever they show the show that he was on from the 1980s we get the old square television format while when it cuts to present day we get the standard widescreen picture. This was a nice touch that I liked and noticed for some reason. The main characters absurdity is my favorite though. Like a delusional wild-man for a protagonist and this one, whose name in the movie is Richard Thorncroft, is totally unself-aware. He meets Kenneth Branagh and treats him like an old friend (and later fantasizes he has gone bald and reveres him), thinks every lady wants to sleep with him (including a woman he ditched during the height of his fame), and thinks himself the Brad Pitt of the Isle of Man. He also thinks he can (and successfully does) dodge bullets by the end of the film.

The movie in a nutshell

Mindhorn has a super fan who is also delusional, thinking he is actually the role he plays on the elective teevee machine, sends him evidence of a crime he is wrongly accused of committing so he will clear his name. Lots of funny stuff here. When his hero is knocked out, for example, the super fan superglues fake hair, the guy's robotic crime solving eye, and fake muscles onto the actor so he looks the role. He is insane. As he is dying, hilariously, he says to Thorncroft, obviously dressed as Mindhorn, "One last thing, Mindhorn. Tell me the truth about Richard Thorncroft. Who is he?" Mindhorn/Thorncroft replies "Let's just say he's someone I used to know." The super fan then gets out "Right, that's..." and seemingly dies. Mindhorn/Thorncroft then says "You poor, deluded fool. I am Richard Thorncroft." The super fan then looks up at him incredulously and then dies. It's super awkward and the hero offers up to his love interest, the one he left years earlier, "At least he didn't die in vain."

Anyways, soooo fucking good. You should definitely make time for this insanity. The parade scene is worth it alone. Totes made me LOL which rarely happens.

I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore is the greatest movie of all time

I fucking love this movie. Also, strangely relatable. Story time: Last year, I had an experience that everyone universally gave me shit for when I confronted a dude that stole a bunch of my things. After riding my bike for an hour, I hopped off, locked it up, and started getting prepared for a run. While I was stretching, I noticed a guy messing with his in the little parking area right there (off Country Club where B-Line begins, Bloomington folks). He’s looking at me. I think he’s tweaking. So back to my stuff. Put my helmet through the bike chain. Tied my seat cover down as well as I can. My pouch with my gloves and my tools is basically an easy target. Don’t know what to do with my high end front and rear lights. I sort of think to myself, “he probably isn’t going to steal your stuff; stop being an asshole.” But I am still thinking about it on my run. My intention was to go three miles and then run back. This time I decided to go a half mile, run back, check my stuff. When I got back to shit, yep, most of it was gone. So quickly I hopped on my bike and booked it in the opposite direction of the way I ran. About a half mile down the trail, there was the guy. Putting my pack on his bike. Screech. Hopped off the bike. Said something along the lines of “are you going to give me my shit back or am I gonna have to kick your ass.”  

I was insane. I am not a violent person, god help me if I ever get into a fight, but I was going on rage. The guy practically shit his pants. If you have never seen me, know that I am large. I am 6 feet 2 inches, 235 lbs. with low body fat. I was a pretty solid linebacker in college and am bigger and stronger than I was then. In tight fitting workout clothes I am superhero esque and am pretty intimidating. He didn’t know what to do so he told me a lie about buying my stuff for $10 from some kid. My response was, “I don’t give a fuck, I am getting my stuff back.” So yanked off my pack (which was damaged and I later found lacked my riding gloves) and grabbed at his backpack. In it was my seat cover but I forgot about my lights until I got home. I thought about attempting a citizen’s arrest but was there alone, with no phone, in a very isolated area. Also in his backpack were women’s shoes and underpants.

After I told people about this, everyone universally thought this was insane and gave me endless worst case scenarios. This movie is one of those scenarios.

Pros: Clever. Original. Funny(ish). Some interesting film noir elements. This is more or less a detective movie. Female protagonist who unearths the mystery of who broke into her home and stole her things and why. It's Pynchonian. I really loved this movie.

Cons: Sometimes a little too cute for its own good. Paints sort of a dark picture of humanity (which could honestly be a pro).

Notes: Start with a girl having a real shit fucking day. Works as a nurse. Dying lady's last words are “keep your goddamn monkey dick out of my good pussy.” Family wants to know the last words. Goes to a bar. Reading some book series. Some ass hat who is also into it spoils the ending for her. Fuuuuuuck. Comes home. House was broken into. The finest sort of blame her. Calls someone. Wants to come over. Cut to her talking it out. The violation of it is what gets to her. So forth. See she talking to a young child. Starts reading a story to the child and breaks down. Kid is like, what the fuck, man. Smokes out with the mom. Basically talking it out. The mom chick says something about her having it better than most. The main girl responds with but people are all “assholes... dildos... fuck-faces...”

Stays there that night much to the dad dude's annoyance. She comes home the next day. Aw shit. Dog turd on the walkway. There is Frodo walking his dog, oblivious. She throws the poop at him. I like this chick.

She finds a footprint in the back yard of the thief. Plasters it. Talks to the neighbors who don't know shit. Then she gets to Frodo's. Rocking out and lifting weights in the backyard. He is sort of an intense weirdo but seems decent. He loses it when she tells him about the robbery he is so moved. Yells at his dog. Whips out nunchucks. She eventually gets a ping for her laptop. She grabs Frodo for backup when retrieving it since the cops won't do shit. They go in. Frodo is fucking insane. Whips out a fucking mace. Some guy tries to grab it. Hits himself in the face with it accidentally. Throws and ninja star and a cherry bomb randomly. They get the laptop back but the people apparently bought it from a consignment shop. Frodo and the girl are amped. They drink and dance about. Looks like a good time.

Cut to the dude wearing the shoe that left that plastered print. He is at a party taking a dump in water receptacle in the back of the toilet. Following this he ganks some more stuff before assaults the host of the party when he threatens to call the cops. He also stares in the mirror like a freak for way too long. He ultimately ends up in the woods smoking meth with other crazy people.

The main girl and Frodo go to the shop where they find her silverware and some geriatric behind the counter. She sees the guy with the shoes and follows him out. The old man chases her down for walking off with the silverware. She sort of accidentally sort of on purpose decks him with with the case. He gets up and breaks one of her fingers like a lunatic. Frodo then pops the guy judo style. It is insane.

They eventually track the guy down to an address, his rich parents' house. For the rest of the movie things grow increasingly more insane as the main girl gets farther and farther into her investigation. Happenings include stealing lawn art, someone get hit by a bus, abduction and forced participation in a home invasion, and projectile vomiting. That is before the wheels come completely fucking off at the end. At that point it turns to more of a traditional horror movie. Fucking great flick.