Tag: bmt 2024

The Strangers: Chapter 1 Preview

“The what?!” Jamie and Patrick say in shock. “The American Society of Movie Nerds,” the man says, rubbing some dirt from the placard as he passes through the door, “Why? What did you think it said?” Patrick and Jamie look at each other. “So, what is this place?” Jamie says after an unnecessarily long pause. They appear to be in a tunnel system of some sort. “Oh, just a place where movie nerds can get together and crunch the numbers on movies,” says the man, who they will come to know as Jacques. But neither of them are listening. For they have just entered a room full of the most wondrous sights. With a trembling hand Jamie reaches for a nearby shelf and gently grabs a VHS copy of Crackerjack. A tear rolls down his face. Jacques dabs his cheeks with a handkerchief. “Careful there,” he says soothingly, “you don’t want to damage the box with your tears.” Have they found their soul mate? They can feel the memory of Kyle fading like a photo of Marty McFly. After Jacques shows them a couple rare VHS copies of lesser known Canadian T&A comedies, Jamie, for the first time, sees a light at the end of his tunnel of grief. He turns to Jacques to ask if he might volunteer here, but Jacques is distracted. Jamie and Patrick huddle with him and see that he’s looking at a couple of fellow nerds. But there is something… off about these nerds. “Huh, that’s funny…” Patrick muses, “why are they so focused on the Star Wars and Star Trek stuff and not…” “the rare stuff,” they all say in unison. “Those aren’t nerds at all!” Jacques says in a panic before pulling an alarm and yelling, “There are strangers among us!” That’s right! There are Strangers among us. The Strangers: Prey at Night and The Strangers: Chapter 1, the two sequels to The Strangers. I’ve never seen any of them so I better buckle up. Let’s go!

The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024) – BMeTric: 67.8; Notability: 22

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 2.0%; Notability: top 9.6%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 7.2%; Higher BMeT: Madame Web, Borderlands, The American Society of Magical Negroes, The Crow, Uglies; Higher Notability: Joker: Folie à Deux, Unfrosted, Reagan, Kraven the Hunter, Borderlands, The Garfield Movie, Madame Web, Here, Back to Black, Argylle, Red One, Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver, Atlas, Lift, Jackpot!, The Union, The Crow, Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part Two, Uglies, Dear Santa, and 4 more; Lower RT: Megamind vs. The Doom Syndicate, Borderlands, Madame Web, Mother of the Bride, Breathe, Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part Two, Kraven the Hunter, Uglies, Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver, Tarot, Reagan, Killer Heat, Canary Black, Mea Culpa, Atlas, Night Swim, Trigger Warning; Notes: Madame Web. Hell yeah. It is entirely possible I’ve said exactly that in another preview. Don’t care. The BMeT on this thing is still absurd. So it the one for American Society. That film was fine.

Variety –  [I]t’s still somewhat refreshing, in this age of lore-heavy expanded universes, that even here the filmmakers (including Bertino, who has a story credit) refuse to tell us anything about the Strangers. The nihilistic randomness of the violence is what makes the film connect on a visceral level; to give them a backstory, or even real names, would be to go against the premise’s central appeal. “Chapter 1” can’t help feeling like an ersatz imitation at times, but it seems the franchise’s well hasn’t run dry just yet. But while it might change in the next two installments, to date nothing in the series has been more chilling than the original intruders’ response when asked why they were doing this: “Because you were home.”

(I actually 100% agree with it. The issue is partially that even the first one wasn’t that good? The premise was interesting, but the acting was kind of insane and everything took way way too long to develop. The later installments don’t really solve the second problem. Unfortunately the solution (more people, more kills) also takes the franchise further from its isolated roots.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pZUQmZdOi4/

(Is this the same movie as the first? The kids are there … it is kind of a weird trick. Like, making a new trilogy as a reboot? Smart. Acting like this isn’t just a reboot of the first one … weird.)

Directors – Renny Harlin – ( Known For: Die Hard 2; Deep Blue Sea; Cliffhanger; The Long Kiss Goodnight; A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master; Cleaner; Devil’s Pass; Skiptrace; The Misfits; 5 Days of War; The Bricklayer; Prison; Born American; Bodies at Rest; Class Reunion 3; Legend of the Ancient Sword; Future BMT: Exorcist: The Beginning; 12 Rounds; BMT: Mindhunters; The Legend of Hercules; The Covenant; Driven; Cutthroat Island; The Strangers: Chapter 1; The Adventures of Ford Fairlane; Notes: It is very weird that they got him for this. He has two more installments, one of which is already completed, so I guess we’ll see where it goes.)

Writers – Alan Freedland and Alan R. Cohen – ( Future BMT: Due Date; BMT: The Strangers: Chapter 1; Notes: They wrote a few different animated things, and specifically ended up being being nominated for three Emmys for King of the Hill, winning one. They seem to have specialized in Bobby-centric episodes.)

Bryan Bertino – ( Known For: The Strangers; The Dark and the Wicked; The Monster; Mockingbird; BMT: The Strangers: Prey at Night; The Strangers: Chapter 1; Notes: He wrote and directed the original. He is a horror director through and through.)

Actors – Madelaine Petsch – ( Known For: Polaroid; About Fate; Sightless; F*&% the Prom; The Curse of Sleeping Beauty; The Hive; Hotel for the Holidays; Jane; BMT: The Strangers: Chapter 1; Notes: She’s in the second and third film I guess. It did show that she survived at the end. She was in 131 episodes of Riverdale.)

Ryan Bown – ( Known For: Palm Beach; Notes: BTW his character suuuuuucks. He is also involved in some shark movie Harlin is directing called Deep Water?)

Matus Lajcak – ( Notes: Scarecrow. He is actually mostly a stunt performer (the usual for horror films). Nothing major though, like, Game of Thrones for one episode.)

Budget/Gross – $8.5 million / Domestic: $35,202,562 (Worldwide: $48,166,448)

(Huge. Will obviously continue to make them, and hopefully the later ones do something a bit more interesting with the concept. Please don’t be another Purge.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 21% (22/106): Lacking the chilling suspense of the original The Strangers and proving to be just unpleasant, this Chapter 1 closes the book on itself.

(Unpleasant is correct. Specifically, for whatever reason, the two main characters appear to be people who don’t particularly like each other but are in a relationship and I really don’t understand that.)

Reviewer Highlight: Once we’re able to see Harlin’s new trilogy as a whole, “Chapter 1” might feel more essential to the 4.5-hour experience. Right now, it just feels overly familiar. – Brian Tallerico, RogerEbert.com

Poster – The Sklogs: Now We’re Dumbos

(This legit looks like trash. It has crossed from mildly annoying to hurting my eyes. The positive is that the eye hurting is in pursuit of something artistic. I’m a little crossed up here. C.)

Tagline(s) – They don’t need a reason. (D)

(This is just kind of the idea of the first film and it’s not clever or interesting. But it’s short. Bless their hearts.)

Keyword(s) – 2024-2024

Top 10: Dune: Part Two (2024), Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024), The Substance (2024), Alien: Romulus (2024), Civil War (2024), The Fall Guy (2024), Gladiator II (2024), Inside Out 2 (2024), Longlegs (2024)

Future BMT: 72.3 Singham Again (2024), 64.5 The Exorcism (2024), 62.6 Imaginary (2024), 62.1 Joker: Folie à Deux (2024), 50.9 Kraven the Hunter (2024), 47.5 Afraid (2024), 30.3 Slingshot (2024), 29.3 Harold and the Purple Crayon (2024), 28.3 Devara Part 1 (2024), 26.0 Fighter (2024), 24.5 Red One (2024), 24.2 Summer Camp (2024), 21.7 The Fabulous Four (2024), 20.0 Reagan (2024), 19.9 Here (2024)

BMT: Madame Web (2024), Borderlands (2024), The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024), The Crow (2024), The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024), Night Swim (2024), Tarot (2024), Argylle (2024), The Watchers (2024), The Garfield Movie (2024), Back to Black (2024)

Best Options (franchise): 50.9 Kraven the Hunter (2024)

(As said, this does actually qualify as a franchise and beats Kraven (somehow), but due to a quirk in the email generation it thinks we already watched it … because we did, months ago. A little peak behind the curtain of BMTHQ here.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 25) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Richard Brake is No. 5 billed in The Strangers: Chapter 1 and No. 7 billed in Doom, which also stars Karl Urban (No. 1 billed) who is in Priest (No. 2 billed) which also stars Paul Bettany (No. 1 billed) who is in Firewall (No. 2 billed) which also stars Harrison Ford (No. 1 billed) who is in Hollywood Homicide (No. 1 billed) which also stars Josh Hartnett (No. 2 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 3 billed) => (5 + 7) + (1 + 2) + (1 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (2 + 3) = 25. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – Renny Harlin simultaneously filmed all three films of this trilogy. The producer explained that the lead star would film scenes for the first film in the morning and scenes for the second in the afternoon, commuting to many different locations for filming several times a day.

According to Froy Gutierrez, filming of all three films took place in Fall of 2022 over a 52-day shoot.

The film’s script was originally 280 pages long based off of notes and ideas which director Renny Harlin and producer Courtney Solomon juggled between each other. They then separated the screenplay into three parts which is now planned to be a trilogy of interlocked stories.

The third film of a series and the first film of a new trilogy. All films of the trilogy are directed by Renny Harlin.

The title suggests that it might be a prequel to the 2008 original, but it isn’t. “The Strangers: Chapter 1” is actually the start of a new trilogy, with two subsequent chapters on the way. It is a new trilogy, only inspired by Bertino’s original.

The Strangers: Prey at Night Preview

“The what?!” Jamie and Patrick say in shock. “The American Society of Movie Nerds,” the man says, rubbing some dirt from the placard as he passes through the door, “Why? What did you think it said?” Patrick and Jamie look at each other. “So, what is this place?” Jamie says after an unnecessarily long pause. They appear to be in a tunnel system of some sort. “Oh, just a place where movie nerds can get together and crunch the numbers on movies,” says the man, who they will come to know as Jacques. But neither of them are listening. For they have just entered a room full of the most wondrous sights. With a trembling hand Jamie reaches for a nearby shelf and gently grabs a VHS copy of Crackerjack. A tear rolls down his face. Jacques dabs his cheeks with a handkerchief. “Careful there,” he says soothingly, “you don’t want to damage the box with your tears.” Have they found their soul mate? They can feel the memory of Kyle fading like a photo of Marty McFly. After Jacques shows them a couple rare VHS copies of lesser known Canadian T&A comedies, Jamie, for the first time, sees a light at the end of his tunnel of grief. He turns to Jacques to ask if he might volunteer here, but Jacques is distracted. Jamie and Patrick huddle with him and see that he’s looking at a couple of fellow nerds. But there is something… off about these nerds. “Huh, that’s funny…” Patrick muses, “why are they so focused on the Star Wars and Star Trek stuff and not…” “the rare stuff,” they all say in unison. “Those aren’t nerds at all!” Jacques says in a panic before pulling an alarm and yelling, “There are strangers among us!” That’s right! There are Strangers among us. The Strangers: Prey at Night and The Strangers: Chapter 1, the two sequels to The Strangers. I’ve never seen any of them so I better buckle up. Let’s go!

The Strangers: Prey at Night (2018) – BMeTric: 53.7; Notability: 13

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 6.4%; Notability: top 24.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 24.6%; Higher BMeT: Slender Man, The Open House, Holmes & Watson, Escape Plan 2: Hades, Fifty Shades Freed, Siberia, The Titan, How It Ends, Gotti, Truth or Dare, Fahrenheit 451, The Predator, Robin Hood, The Nun, The Possession of Hannah Grace, The Week Of; Higher Notability: Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, Venom, The Predator, The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, The Happytime Murders, Hunter Killer, Holmes & Watson, Mortal Engines, Death Wish, The Cloverfield Paradox, Fifty Shades Freed, Game Over, Man!, 7 Days in Entebbe, Johnny English Strikes Again, Overboard, The Girl in the Spider’s Web, The 15:17 to Paris, Gringo, Welcome to Marwen, The Darkest Minds, and 40 more; Lower RT: Gotti, The Open House, Billionaire Boys Club, Escape Plan 2: Hades, Slender Man, Replicas, Holmes & Watson, The Professor, Fifty Shades Freed, Winchester, Siberia, Little Italy, Peppermint, Life Itself, The Outsider, Robin Hood, The Darkest Minds, Truth or Dare, Look Away, The Kissing Booth, and 41 more; Notes: Slender Man, oh, the promise of the Bye Bye Man vibes, but just never really got there. Amazing it appears to have the highest BMeT of any film from 2018. That’s wild. Someday Gotti. Someday.

RogerEbert.com – 3.5 stars – Ten years is a long gap between a movie and its sequel, especially for a horror movie. That gap, though, seems as if it was enough time for the filmmakers of “The Strangers: Prey at Night” to get it right.

(Oh snap. The odd thing about Prey at Night is just that. I thought it was like … well received. Then it turned out it wasn’t? Kind of wild. Have we ever done a four star RogerEbert.com film? I venture to say no, although it is more possible since his passing and specifically a Horror film I would think.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNQrKls7k-Q/

(So … the same movie as before? I guess that is the allure of franchises like this. The same thing but more extreme and weirder over and over and over again. Like Saw.)

Directors – Johannes Roberts – ( Known For: 47 Meters Down; 47 Meters Down: Uncaged; The Other Side of the Door; V/H/S/99; Storage 24; F; Forest of the Damned; Hellbreeder; BMT: Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City; The Strangers: Prey at Night; Notes: Man, Racoon City, remember that one? Oh snap, she has an upcoming film called Primate which is effectively just Cujo with a chimp.)

Writers – Bryan Bertino – ( Known For: The Strangers; The Dark and the Wicked; The Monster; Mockingbird; BMT: The Strangers: Prey at Night; The Strangers: Chapter 1; Notes: Writer for the original. He has a film coming out this year (it claims) called Vicious with Dakota Fanning.)

Ben Ketai – ( Known For: Malevolent; River Wild; Johnny Frank Garrett’s Last Word; BMT: The Forest; The Strangers: Prey at Night; Notes: He has some Crackle show called StartUp with Ron Perlman he created and wrote 30 episodes for. Television is wild man.)

Actors – Christina Hendricks – ( Known For: Drive; Toy Story 4; The Neon Demon; Detachment; Dark Places; Scoob!; Crooked House; Lost River; Struck by Lightning; God’s Pocket; Ginger & Rosa; American Woman; Candy Jar; Pottersville; The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry; The Family Tree; Company; Egg; Leonie; South of Pico; Future BMT: Life as We Know It; Bad Santa 2; BMT: Zoolander 2; Fist Fight; The Strangers: Prey at Night; I Don’t Know How She Does It; Notes: Remember Man Men? She is still doing a ton of television (lots of voice work), and has some mini-series upcoming. She was nominated for six Emmys. Never won. Which seems crazy. I think she ran into a buzzsaw of Justified, The Good Wife, and Downton Abbey. Still … at the very least the second season right?)

Martin Henderson – ( Known For: The Ring; Everest; X; Miracles from Heaven; Bride & Prejudice; Battle in Seattle; Little Fish; Skagerrak; Cedar Boys; The Moment; Kick; Future BMT: Smokin’ Aces; Windtalkers; Flyboys; BMT: The Strangers: Prey at Night; Torque; Devil’s Knot; Notes: Is very much in some television series called Virgin River. And then has something called Alphas in post-production.)

Bailee Madison – ( Known For: Bridge to Terabithia; Brothers; Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark; Conviction; Lonely Hearts; Phoebe in Wonderland; A Week Away; Play Dead; An Invisible Sign; Look; Cowgirls ‘n Angels; Saving Sarah Cain; A Cinderella Story: Starstruck; A Cowgirl’s Story; Watercolor Postcards; 25 Hill; Future BMT: Parental Guidance; Letters to God; BMT: Just Go with It; The Strangers: Prey at Night; Notes: Was in 57 episodes of some series called Good Witch. And she’s in the Pretty Little Liars … spin off? I have no idea what Original Sin is.)

Budget/Gross – $5 million / Domestic: $24,586,708 (Worldwide: $31,039,126)

(That’s great. I don’t really understand why it took so long to make a sequel and why it took so long to just go for the trilogy … then again, the new one is apparently terrible.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 40% (49/124): The Strangers: Prey at Night may appeal to fans of the original who’ve been jonesing for a sequel, but its thin story and ironic embrace of genre tropes add up to a bloody step back.

(Juuuuuuuust barely qualifies. Pretty silly. For years it didn’t, but then I think they got rid of one of the reviews or something? The lack of clarity on Rotten Tomatoes is quite frustrating. It really should operate a lot more like wikipedia than … whatever it is.)

Reviewer Highlight: Two films in, The Strangers has already become a horribly familiar franchise. – Clack Collis, EW

Poster – The Sklogs: Rich and Poe

(This is treating The Strangers like it’s Texas Chainsaw. Otherwise it’s… still kind of bad. Bad font. Looks kind of cheap. I don’t like it much at all. But it doesn’t hurt my eyes. C-.)

Tagline(s) – Let us prey. (B-)

(I mean, yes. I will ding it for being too generic.)

Keyword(s) – 2024-2024

Top 10: Dune: Part Two (2024), Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024), The Substance (2024), Alien: Romulus (2024), Civil War (2024), The Fall Guy (2024), Gladiator II (2024), Inside Out 2 (2024), Longlegs (2024)

Future BMT: 72.3 Singham Again (2024), 64.5 The Exorcism (2024), 62.6 Imaginary (2024), 62.1 Joker: Folie à Deux (2024), 50.9 Kraven the Hunter (2024), 47.5 Afraid (2024), 30.3 Slingshot (2024), 29.3 Harold and the Purple Crayon (2024), 28.3 Devara Part 1 (2024), 26.0 Fighter (2024), 24.5 Red One (2024), 24.2 Summer Camp (2024), 21.7 The Fabulous Four (2024), 20.0 Reagan (2024), 19.9 Here (2024)

BMT: Madame Web (2024), Borderlands (2024), The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024), The Crow (2024), The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024), Night Swim (2024), Tarot (2024), Argylle (2024), The Watchers (2024), The Garfield Movie (2024), Back to Black (2024)

Best Options (franchise): 50.9 Kraven the Hunter (2024)

(Since this is a bonus it won’t show up. And also because of how I generated the email it also thinks we haven’t seen The Strangers: Chapter 1. But it is one of two good options, and Kraven was a bonus Live we did right at the last minute, so this was the best option.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 16) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Bailee Madison is No. 1 billed in The Strangers: Prey at Night and No. 6 billed in Just Go with It, which also stars Adam Sandler (No. 1 billed) who is in Jack and Jill (No. 1 billed) which also stars Al Pacino (No. 2 billed) who is in 88 Minutes (No. 1 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (1 + 6) + (1 + 1) + (2 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 16. There is no shorter path at the moment.

Notes – Before the script was re-written, Kristen McKay (Liv Tyler) from the first film was going to return for only for the opening scene, where she would be killed.

This film was announced back in 2009.

There’s a scene in the movie where Luke puts down a pistol on top of a book. The title of the book was “A Stranger is Watching.”

The Man In The Mask is the only killer in the film to not have any lines of dialogue.

The director admittedly doesn’t like slasher movies or home invasion movies.

The American Society of Magical Negroes Recap

Jamie

The American Society of Magical [Shut your mouth!]. You could see this movie coming a mile away. It feels a lot like a Black List script. These are scripts that circulate Hollywood and get high marks but for whatever reason don’t get produced. They used to have a podcast where they would act them out and I have to say… it was usually pretty clear why they didn’t get made. As I recall one of them prominently featured Tom Cruise playing himself in a kind of Nic Cage style action-comedy (note: can we use Nic Cage instead?). Another was a rude-crude comedy that seemed like it was written when Porky’s was all the rage (note: do you have a time machine?). Another was a lesbian romance set in the Hasidic Jewish community of NYC (note: how good are you at marketing?). This… well, I think you can see why I might think that would fit the mold.

To recap, Aren is an artist. More specifically he is a struggling artist. He’s struggling with his voice and standing up for his art. Roger, a bartender at one of his shows, takes a liking to him and lets him in on a little secret. He’s part of the American Society of Magical Negroes. Like the trope from film they are tasked with saving the world from sad white people. Sad white people do terrible things and make terrible mistakes. The happier the white people are, the safer the world is. Ultimately, Aren takes on the task of making Jason, a tech bro, happy by helping him get together with his work crush, Lizzie. Easier said than done when Aren realizes that Lizzie is pretty cool and maybe he kind of likes her. Also Jason, while affable and well-meaning, is also selfish and self-centered. He idolizes the idiotic boss of their tech company and is prone to taking credit for things that he didn’t do. It becomes harder and harder for Aren to justify helping this dope get with this super cool, smart and talented girl of his dreams. However, Aren is reminded that they are saving the world. But when Aren is invited to co-present a new diversity program with Jason, an off-hand offensive remark by Jason emboldens him to set the record straight on their companies bad policies. Before he is kicked out of the Society, he ends up revealing the secret to Lizzie by using his powers to teleport her. Ultimately, after Lizzie is able to return to LA following the teleportation, they get together and smooch hard… also she’s part of her own society or whatever. THE END.

I actually think this movie is better than fine. It’s bordering on good, even. I read a lot of reviews that were like “really pulled the punch. Should have gone further.” I mean, I guess if you mean it should have been 100% biting satire and not be a romantic comedy. Sure… but I liked the two leads well enough and as a rom com it was perfectly serviceable. I don’t know. I was unexpectedly taken with this film and actually thought they went pretty far with the idea. I mean, their meter for whether they are doing a good job measures white tears. It’s a bit of a fluffy movie. Definitely feels like a streaming movie. But I actually thought it was fun enough, the acting was fine, and they took the concept where it needed to go. My primary critique would be that the girl almost certainly should have been part of the American Society for Manic Pixie Dream Girls. If there was one pulled punch, I think it might be that. It’s so obvious and the character fits the stereotype. But given how the term has fallen out of favor it feels like it was  abandoned for something else that made no sense. So why even do it?

Hot Take Clam Bake! So like… now the guy he was supposed to help becomes a mass murderer or something? He failed, right? The dude is super sad because he was called a racist on a public live stream… fine, he wasn’t exactly called racist, but it was implied. The white tears were a-flowin. That’s not good. Or at least that’s what I was led to believe. So pretty sad movie in the end. Hot Take Temperature: Warm wool sweater art.

Patrick?

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! *Gif of me definitely, totally watching this film. I definitely totally watched it* Let’s go!

Fun fact: I didn’t watch this movie until March 2025. For real. Just never really felt like or of felt the need to as we ended up very far behind on the emails. So there it sat, burned onto my phone, waiting for me to watch it.

The Good? I mean, the movie? It is wild that this is considered (by most metrics) one of the worst films of the year. It’s fun. I suppose it depends a bit on how much mileage you get out of all the Justice Smith of it all, but for real: the movie is fun and kind of good. If you are up for it and go into it with a clear mind.

The Bad? The movie isn’t funny per se. It is a comedy that is clever. It makes you go “that’s funny.” Or maybe smirk a bit and think “that’s funny.” And even those moments are few and far between. The two main characters I think are very good though and I think both are going to end up doing things in the future. Well, Justice Smith already is, he’s quietly one of the biggest young movie stars we got.

The BMT? Hell naw. I’m never watching this film again. I’m never thinking about this film again. This film was a checkbox for 2024 and that is all. Good luck to everyone involved. Personally I think your movie was pretty funny and good.

So if you are following the recaps you’ll know the saga of the batch image processing. Well, I’m almost there … maybe, kind of. Anyways, the current issue is that the models don’t seem to be able to accurately bring back indices. So let’s help them along:

Besides the one instance where it was probably like “I’m busy” or something, this worked flawlessly. As in the example, all I did was add the index to the top of the posters. There is a slight concern still (what if the title is quite near the top and also has a number?), but that feels quite fixable (which I’ll explore next). I am quite close to getting this to work.

In a way there is Product Placement (What?) for VR stuff in general, so I’m going to count it. A very Setting as a Character (Where?) L.A. film. I do think the whole movie has a MacGuffin (Why?) of the dream girl in general, which they play off of in the end. And in the vein I liked the twist actually, I thought it was clever, although it was a bit too little too late. The movie is Good, don’t at me.

Read all about uh … secret societies? Probably, in the Quiz. Cheerios,

The Sklogs

The American Society of Magical Negroes Quiz

What is the oldest Secret Society in America? The Flat Hat Club of the College of William & Mary? Hell naw, it’s the American Society of Magical Negroes! Let’s go!

Pop Quiz Hot Shot!

1) Now, you should be able to get that The Skull and Bones are one of the big three Secret Societies at Yale. Name either of the other two that are considered the Big Three.

2) Played by Will Smith, what is the name of probably the most well known example of the Magical Negro trope in modern films?

3) And not to spoil the ending (but spoilers), but in the end we also learn the love interest is a Manic Pixie Dream Girl for the primary fragile white male character. What movie involves a subversion of this trope by Zooey Deschanel towards Joseph Gorden-Levitt?

4) Besides the answer to Number 2 they also explicitly show another example of the Magical Negro trope, in particular where a death row prisoner fixes a white guard’s dick. This is quite explicitly the storyline for The Green Mile. Who wrote the original novel?

5) Now, the main character loves his yarn art. What does yarn remind me of? Spinning yarn. What does that remind me of? Rumplestilskin. What does Rumplestiltskin remind me of? Shrek obviously. Which Shrek film is Rumplestiltskin the villain?

Bonus NYTimes Listing Question: Someone once claimed Whoopi in Ghost was a Magical Negress. I don’t know if I believe it, but that did play Primetime on HBO on October 6, 1991 up against:

What is this Rewatchables movie?

Answers

The American Society of Magical Negroes Preview

You could always count on the librarians to have the answers. After listening to Black to Black over and over for a week, Jamie finally agreed to come with Patrick to the ‘brary to return it. “Maybe you can pick up some more death metal… or really anything,” Patrick says brimming with excitement as they neared the library. “Anything?” Jamie says skeptically, but Patrick is already speed walking to the door. He waves hello to Denise and Denise as he enters and points in excitement at Jamie. “You wanna look at some old newspapers? The library even has those. They’ve got all kinds of cool things in them like TV listings and… mostly that really.” Jamie nods. That is kind of cool. But looking around he gets a crackerjack idea. “What about a VHS copy of Crackerjack?” He says, suddenly hopeful. Patrick nods hesitantly and looks at Nathaniel. Nathaniel shakes his beak quickly. “Uh, let’s ask Denise,” Patrick says approaching the front desk, his eyes pleading with either of the Denises to think of something. “Well, unfortunately back in 2003, around the time that a fun, but quite bad, Celtics team was getting swept by the Pacers,” Jamie and Patrick wince, “we actually discontinued and disposed of all…” but just as she’s about to destroy everything Patrick has worked for, she’s interrupted by a loud creaking of a nearby door. “Ahem…” a small, wizened old man coughs, “Perhaps I can be of assistance, Denise.” The Denises look at each other in confusion. They’d never seen this man in their life… in fact, they’ve never seen the door he’s come out of before and they’ve been working the ‘brary scene for nigh 25 years. A small placard on the door says that it leads to The American Society of… That’s right! We’re watching The American Society of Magical Negroes. You’re probably thinking “That sounds like a bad idea.” You’d probably be right. Let’s go!

The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024) – BMeTric: 68.9; Notability: 18

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 0.8%; Notability: top 12.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 12.4%; Higher BMeT: Madame Web, Borderlands; Higher Notability: Joker: Folie à Deux, Reagan, Borderlands, The Garfield Movie, Madame Web, Back to Black, Here, Argylle, Kraven the Hunter, Lift, Red One, Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver, Jackpot!, Atlas, The Union, The Crow, Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part Two, My Spy The Eternal City, Harold and the Purple Crayon, A Family Affair, and 10 more; Lower RT: Tyler Perry’s Divorce in the Black, Megamind vs. The Doom Syndicate, Borderlands, Madame Web, Mother of the Bride, Kraven the Hunter, Breathe, Uglies, Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver, Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part Two, Tarot, Reagan, Killer Heat, Canary Black, Mea Culpa, Atlas, Night Swim, Dear Santa, Trigger Warning, The Strangers: Chapter 1, and 8 more; Notes: The BMeTric is not surprisingly off the chain. Fun fact: not that bad of a movie, just a bit tepid and boring.

Variety – “The American Society of Magical Negroes,” a comedy of racial images that’s every bit as witty and scandalous as “American Fiction” (it almost feels like a kind of cousin to Cord Jefferson’s film), only this one follows through on the outrage. The writer-director, Kobi Libii, wants to make us laugh and twist our heads at the same time. He brings it off. “The American Society of Magical Negroes” is a deftly observant fantasy comedy that stays true to its own irreverence.

(Nice. I kind of genuinely agree. The film is satire. Whether it bites is really up to whether you find any of it even remotely amusing.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gizIbhk5Eu4/

(This trailer looks dumb except when it goes real extreme. The White Tears meter is objectively funny. But mostly it looks dumb and like a generic romantic comedy.)

Directors – Kobi Libii – ( BMT: The American Society of Magical Negroes; Notes: He was actually an actor in real television shows, like Madam Secretary and Alpha House.)

Writers – Kobi Libii – ( BMT: The American Society of Magical Negroes; Notes: He wrote a V show with Jordan Klepper on Comedy Central which I’ve never heard of.)

Actors – Justice Smith – ( Known For: Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom; Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves; Pokémon: Detective Pikachu; Paper Towns; Ron’s Gone Wrong; All the Bright Places; The Voyeurs; Sharper; I Saw the TV Glow; Every Day; BMT: Jurassic World Dominion; The American Society of Magical Negroes; Notes: To have this and then I Saw the TV Glow in the same year is something. I really like him, although I can understand why someone might not. He has a flat affectation. Works for me.)

Zachary Barton – ( Known For: Kajillionaire; BMT: The American Society of Magical Negroes; Notes: Oh yeah … these are fake. This is the first time in a long time where they did the actual credits order (which is by appearance).)

Anthony Coons – ( BMT: The American Society of Magical Negroes; Notes: The last time this happened was, I believe, Barb Wire. I’m choosing not to alter it.)

Budget/Gross – N/A / Domestic: $2,480,645 (Worldwide: $2,496,248)

(This certainly lost quite a bit of money. Justice Smith probably got paid enough to put this in the red.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 25% (20/79): The American Society of Magical Negroes has a promising premise, but is too timid to fully engage with its most provocative ideas.

(Yeah, I can actually see that. It is a little quiet and timid, but that is kind of what you get from Justice Smith. I would have thought somewhere between 30-50% though, that is low.)

Reviewer Highlight: It’s not only utterly bereft of magic, but what it lacks it’s that sense of anarchic strangeness or weirdness… – Mark Kermode

Poster – American Society of Movie Nerds

(Did they not have a budget? Don’t mind the font and at least a little artistic. C+.)

Tagline(s) – Saving the damn world. (B-)

(I get what they’re up to here. I won’t say it’s good. But it’s subtle and I can appreciate that.)

Keyword(s) – 2024-2024

Top 10: Dune: Part Two (2024), Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024), Civil War (2024), Inside Out 2 (2024), The Fall Guy (2024), Alien: Romulus (2024), Road House (2024), The Substance (2024), The Beekeeper (2024)

Future BMT: 62.3 The Exorcism (2024), 61.6 Imaginary (2024), 61.6 Joker: Folie à Deux (2024), 36.0 Singham Again (2024), 27.4 Slingshot (2024), 27.2 Harold and the Purple Crayon (2024), 25.9 Fighter (2024), 24.8 Devara Part 1 (2024), 19.0 Reagan (2024), 16.7 Here (2024), 11.6 Red One (2024)

BMT: Madame Web (2024), Borderlands (2024), The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024), The Crow (2024), Night Swim (2024), The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024), Tarot (2024), Argylle (2024), The Watchers (2024), The Garfield Movie (2024), Back to Black (2024)

Best Options (From the Hip): 69.1 The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024)

(Yup, we really painted ourselves in a corner with this one. I remember having to very specifically work backwards and forwards a ton to eventually get the full chain to even work out. Thank god for David Alan Greer.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 22) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: David Alan Grier is No. 2 billed in The American Society of Magical Negroes and No. 8 billed in Tiptoes, which also stars Kate Beckinsale (No. 4 billed) who is in Pearl Harbor (No. 2 billed) which also stars Josh Hartnett (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 3 billed) => (2 + 8) + (4 + 2) + (3 + 3) = 22. If we were to watch Blankman we can get the HoE Number down to 16.

Notes – The film was pulled from theaters after three weeks.

Spike Lee coined the term “magical negro” around 2000. It refers to a stereotypical Black supporting character who exists solely to aid a white protagonist. Examples include Forrest Gump (1994), The Green Mile (1999), and The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000).

The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.

This is Kobi Libii’s feature film directorial and screenwriting debut.

Back to Black Recap

Jamie

What is there to say about Back to Black? Nothing, that’s what.

To recap, Amy Winehouse is not yet a star. She’s just a girl that loves singing. Loves playing guitar. Loves her grandma. And yes, she loves drinking. When her demo ends up at Island Records she begins her road to stardom and releases her debut album. But then? Not as much as should happen. They want her to be more pop. She wants to be Amy Winehouse. In an ensuing break she meets Blake at a bar. They start a torrid, messy, on-again, off-again love affair. After things get particularly messy, Blake leaves and Amy is left heartbroken. This is exacerbated by the grief of finding out her grandma is dying of cancer. She channels all this into her second smash hit album Back to Black. In the wake of this success, she gets back together with Blake and they elope. Ultimately this turns tragic when Blake is arrested for assault and Amy is left to deal with her demons on her own. A series of messy, drunken performances ensue. By the time Blake gets out of prison, Amy is a drug addict and he is in recovery and so he asks for a divorce. She spirals even further and eventually admits that she needs to go to rehab. She battles recovery for several years while Blake moves on. Eventually she loses the battle and passes away. THE END.

Before commenting on the actual quality of this film, I think it should be made clear that I am not a particular fan of Amy Winehouse. I have no special connection to her music. It’s good. I remember hearing it when it came out and there were some bops. I also never saw the documentary. I don’t know much about her life and death. I don’t know much about her husband or her dad. Alright… this film is fine. I don’t see what the big hubbub was about. Perfectly middle of the road movie. Some good music. I thought the acting was better than fine. A tragic story. I think everyone comes off poorly, which is mildly amusing as I believe the controversy surrounding it was that it’s too closely connected to the family and so lets them off the hook… so… this is letting them off the hook? Eeesh. Anyway, It’s not particularly good, but there are good things about it. One particularly bad thing about it is that it forces me to take recapping and talking about the film very seriously when this whole enterprise is meant to be a joke. And I don’t like that. I prefer to have a larf.

Hot Take Clam Bake! Oh man, I got a white hot take. But it would be in bad taste, right? Like this is a heat seeking missile. An absolute sizzler. A complete Uno Pizzeria & Grill. If I dropped this scorcher you would think you were in the Scorch Trials. You would take one look at my take and ask where Dante was because you done found yourself in the Inferno. It’s the full body burn of takes. And everyone knows that if you are going to have a full body burn in your movie you may as well have two (you already got the full body burn guy on set). Well guess what? This is the equivalent of a film with three full body burns. I can’t drop it though. Bad taste and all. But if I did… oh ho… watch out! You’d be burnt. Hot Take Temperature: theoretically intense. 

Patrick?

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! *Gif of me singing my little heart out and just loving bad boys, you know?* Let’s go!

The Good? The singing is quite good. And as a person who has never seen the documentary Amy this was a good excuse to wiki a bunch of stuff about her and get to know something about someone I really didn’t know much about before.

The Bad? Arguably this film is propaganda. I’m not saying it is either way, but it does feel like the involvement of the family, as usual, throws into question the objective nature of the film. And given the ultimate conclusion of the story that feels a bit gross. The film is pretty long and everything but the singing is either bland or sad. I don’t like that. People who know me always say there are two things Patrick doesn’t like: things that are bland, and things that are sad. (Editor’s Note: that’s true, that’s what I always say)

The BMT? Hell to the no. Why would I ever watch this film again? Why did I watch this film at all? I wonder if in the future we’ll have to replace the Romance category like we replaced the Sci Fi category long ago and very explicitly call it the Romance/Drama category. I do think it is much more likely we could find good Dramas in the end, at least those are more likely to be bad because they are weird instead of dull.

I said I had some thoughts on how to get indexing done in the last Recap … but that isn’t for today. Instead, I just wanted to look and see if using smaller images would do anything drastic. Why smaller? Well, there are two paths according to the documentation, one for images of size <300ish pixels, and one for larger. I, by default, tend to use 280×420 as my poster size when saving stuff. But I did wonder whether that was contributing to the indexing problems. So I decided to test it with 140×210 posters instead:

Nope. Didn’t help. Onwards and upwards.

Obvs this is basically a Where’s Where or Setting as a Character (Where?) for bits and bobs of London. I recognized a ton of places, mainly because Camden Town is quite a good vegan neighborhood in London. I’ll leave it at that though. This film is Bad, in that it is boring, but it is closer to good than BMT in the end regardless because at least the singing is pretty good.

Read all about dark things I assume in the Quiz,

Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Back to Black Quiz

Singing? A tragic story of drug and alcohol abuse? Talk to me people! Let’s go!

Pop Quiz Hot Shot!

1) Let’s start with a super applicable question: Online there are a multitude of videos concerning coating objects or even whole rooms with a super-black coating to see how it absorbs over 99% of visible light. What is the name of the coating invented by Jen Jensen in 2014?

2) Back in Black isn’t the name of this movie or the album being alluded to. It is the 1980 album by AC/DC, which was the first to feature which lead singer (formerly of Geordie) who had replaced Bon Scott who had died in early 1980?

3) The director Sam Taylor-Johnson met and subsequently married her husband Aaron Taylor-Johnson on the set of her directorial debut film from 2009 called what? It is based on the childhood of John Lennon. 

4) The movie stars Marisa Abela, who does quite a good job in mimicking Amy Winehouse in the end. She is currently notable for starring as Yasmin in what HBO series?

5) Amy Winehouse is famously from Camden Town. What large Royal Park is just to the south of Camden Town?

Bonus NYTimes Listing Question: On October 3, 1990, the film Back to School played on Showtime in primetime up against:

What is this film?

Answers

Back to Black Preview

Patrick sadly returns the copy of Tarot to the shelves of the ‘brary. He waves to Denise and Denise, the two librarians, who flash him a thumbs up. Since he’s been around so much they’ve started letting him return things to the shelves himself. “Caw,” Nathaniel caws. “Meow,” Mr. Whiskers meows. “I know,” Patrick says like a human. He wasn’t sad because Tarot was bad, it was exactly what he needed after bathing in Jamie’s eternal Night Swim. He was sad because everything he had tried hadn’t worked. What man could resist a cat, a crow and some chills? It didn’t make sense. “Hey Patrick,” one of the Denises says handing him a few more DVDs to stock. “I couldn’t help but overhear what you’ve been going through.” Patrick nods in appreciation. “It’s just,” she continues, “your crow and cat are delightful.” ‘Obviously’, Patrick silently scoffs in his head. “And Tarot is something the whole family can enjoy to unwind after a long week of not watching Tarot,” she says carefully. Patrick is confused as to why Denise insists on wasting his valuable restocking time telling him a bunch of obvious things. “But did you think maybe Jamie doesn’t want delightful things?” Denise finishes, hoping that Patrick was listening. Oh Patrick was listening all right. He was listening and thinking. Everyone knows what Jamie likes to listen to when he’s feeling up (Your Body is a Wonderland by John Mayer, duh), but what was his wallow music? And where would he find it? Suddenly he hears the distinctive “Caw!” of Nathaniel. “No fudging way,” he says, looking at the crow pecking at the CD by the very sad Norwegian death metal band Black to Black sitting right there on the glorious shelf of the glorious ‘brary. That’s right! You probably guessed it, but we are watching the Amy Winehouse biopic Back to Black. You might be asking, ‘Why?’ We would also be asking that. Let’s go!

Back to Black (2024) – BMeTric: 21.0; Notability: 45

StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 18.8%; Notability: top 2.0%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 18.6%; Higher BMeT: Madame Web, Borderlands, The American Society of Magical Negroes, Uglies, The Crow, Night Swim, The Strangers: Chapter 1, Tarot, Trigger Warning, The Exorcism, Imaginary, Joker: Folie à Deux, Mother of the Bride, Hellboy: The Crooked Man, Megamind vs. The Doom Syndicate, Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver, Mea Culpa, The Deliverance, Breathe, Time Cut, and 27 more; Higher Notability: Joker: Folie à Deux, Reagan, Borderlands, The Garfield Movie, Madame Web; Lower RT: Tyler Perry’s Divorce in the Black, Megamind vs. The Doom Syndicate, Borderlands, Madame Web, Mother of the Bride, Kraven the Hunter, Breathe, Uglies, Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver, Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part Two, Tarot, Reagan, Killer Heat, Canary Black, Mea Culpa, Atlas, Night Swim, Dear Santa, Trigger Warning, The Strangers: Chapter 1, and 22 more; Notes:

Variety – Amy, contrary to her mythology, does end up in rehab. Near the end of her life, she gets clean, as Janis Joplin did. But that isn’t enough to keep her from becoming a member of the cautionary club of pop stars who died at 27 (Janis, Jimi, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain). Her self-destruction is on full display in “Back to Black.” Yet the film presents it, even revels in it, without giving you the sense that it fully understands it.

(At one point I recall there being some issue with the involvement of either the ex-husband of Winehouse (unlikely) or her father, which made the film potentially a response to the Amy documentary which I think was very critical of her father. Given that I fully expected the critical response to be poor.)

Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlW-jEscGgM/

(There was a better trailer (one where it seemed a little like there was a more traditional path to stardom … so I suppose deceptive maybe), but this one is still good. The music and singing seem killer.)

Directors – Sam Taylor-Johnson – ( Known For: Nowhere Boy; A Million Little Pieces; Destricted; BMT: Fifty Shades of Grey; Back to Black; Notes: She’s kind of a weird director in that she seems to fully be in the “paycheck” movie phase. She has nothing on the docket at the moment.)

Writers – Matt Greenhalgh – ( Known For: Control; Nowhere Boy; Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool; The Look of Love; BMT: Back to Black; Notes: Well, that at least explains why Taylor-Johnson is involved, he wrote Nowhere Boy.)

Actors – Marisa Abela – ( Known For: Barbie; Rogue Agent; She Is Love; BMT: Back to Black; Notes: Well known for Industry, the only real laudets for the movie were in her singing which is, indeed, pretty impressive. She is in Black Bag which is interesting.)

Eddie Marsan – ( Known For: V for Vendetta; Deadpool 2; Sherlock Holmes; Hancock; Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows; Gangs of New York; The Gentlemen; Mission: Impossible III; The Illusionist; Snow White and the Huntsman; The World’s End; 21 Grams; Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw; Match Point; Wrath of Man; Atomic Blonde; War Horse; Vice; Jack the Giant Slayer; Miami Vice; Future BMT: The Man Who Knew Too Little; 7 Days in Entebbe; BMT: Back to Black; Notes: I recognize him from Happy-Go-Lucky. He’s in a ton of TV at the moment, and is pencilled in for the probably-never-going-to-happen Sherlock Holmes 3 still.)

Jack O’Connell – ( Known For: 300: Rise of an Empire; Unbroken; This Is England; Money Monster; Eden Lake; Harry Brown; ’71; Ferrari; Starred Up; Lady Chatterley’s Lover; The Man with the Iron Heart; United; Trial by Fire; Seberg; The Liability; Little Fish; Jungleland; Tower Block; Weekender; Private Peaceful; Future BMT: Tulip Fever; BMT: Back to Black; Notes: He’s in both 28 Years Later and Sinners this year which … either of those could be good. The trailer for 28 Years Later at least looks incredible.)

Budget/Gross – $30 million / Domestic: $6,157,705 (Worldwide: $50,979,416)

(Not great. Kind of weird the budget is so high, maybe because of the concert stuff and paying the Winehouse Estate? Just seems crazy considering there is really no stars.)

Rotten Tomatoes – 35% (63/181): Back to Black’s sympathetic approach to its subject’s story is an overdue antidote to the tabloid treatment she often received in life, even if the end results are disappointingly pedestrian.

(Again, the issue is being sympathetic to Amy Winehouse is one thing, but the documentary, fairly or unfairly, makes the treatment of the father in the film seem a little off somehow.)

Reviewer Highlight: Much like the rabid tabloid coverage Winehouse faced, Back to Black is a lazy attempt to capitalize on both the success and struggles of a great artist. – Emma Oxnevad, Chicago Reader

Poster – Back to Bakula

(I mean, I guess if I was super into Amy Winehouse this poster would make me excited for it. Despite being serviceable, I’m going to give it right in the middle because the font is the worst I’ve ever seen. C.)

Tagline(s) – Her music. Her life. Her legacy. (C+)

(I like the classic structure of this. It is extremely generic, though. Like why couldn’t this be the tagline to Selena?)

Keyword(s) – 2024-2024

Top 10: Dune: Part Two (2024), Deadpool & Wolverine (2024), Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024), Civil War (2024), Inside Out 2 (2024), The Fall Guy (2024), Alien: Romulus (2024), Road House (2024), The Substance (2024), The Beekeeper (2024)

Future BMT: 62.3 The Exorcism (2024), 61.6 Imaginary (2024), 61.6 Joker: Folie à Deux (2024), 36.0 Singham Again (2024), 27.4 Slingshot (2024), 27.2 Harold and the Purple Crayon (2024), 25.9 Fighter (2024), 24.8 Devara Part 1 (2024), 19.0 Reagan (2024), 16.7 Here (2024), 11.6 Red One (2024)

BMT: Madame Web (2024), Borderlands (2024), The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024), The Crow (2024), Night Swim (2024), The Strangers: Chapter 1 (2024), Tarot (2024), Argylle (2024), The Watchers (2024), The Garfield Movie (2024)

Best Options (Romance): 21.0 Back to Black (2024)

(Arguably this is our Romance film, but clearly that is in lieu of any other option. Is Romance dead? As a genre I mean, not in general.)

Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 58) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Bronson Webb is No. 26 billed in Back to Black and No. 19 billed in Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, which also stars Penélope Cruz (No. 2 billed) who is in Captain Corelli’s Mandolin (No. 2 billed) which also stars Nicolas Cage (No. 1 billed) who is in The Wicker Man (No. 1 billed) which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 6 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (26 + 19) + (2 + 2) + (1 + 1) + (6 + 1) = 58. If we were to watch Entebbe, Surrogates, The Jackal, Nights in Rodanthe, and The Glass House we can get the HoE Number down to 21.

Notes – Marisa Abela had done most of the singing in this film herself. She trained extensively to mimic Amy Winehouse’s vocals.

Scenes were filmed at Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club at 47 Frith Street, Soho, London W1D 4HT, England and outside Winehouse’s first flat in Camden Town, and at Primrose Hill, London. In February, scenes were filmed inside the Metropolis Studios in Chiswick, London.

Jeff Tunke claimed he was cast as Mark Ronson and his scenes were deleted. However, director Sam Taylor-Johnson said Ronson was never a character in the film.

Following the death of Winehouse on July 23, 2011, several filmmakers attempted to create biopic projects but none of them progressed. By 2022, StudioCanal UK moved forward with production, and filming took place in London from January to April 2023.

Tarot Recap

Jamie

The funny story about Tarot really has more to do with Night Swim… and even that has more to do with that terrible horror film Fear… and even that has more to do, maybe, with the fact that I’m watching way more contemporary horror films than ever before. Certainly part of my dive into the genre is experiencing the wide range of films in “horror”. Some don’t even really feel like horror films, like I Saw the TV Glow, and yet touch on ideas or themes associated with the genre and so they are part of the ever growing horror miasma. Also part of that is the lengths to which these films often go to explore important themes. Like Night Swim spending a large portion of its film concerned with the loss of purpose felt by a baseball player forced into early retirement. Cool stuff, Night Swim. Actually interesting… but also you’re about a haunted pool and I would have loved a bit more about that part, actually. Oh, Fear? How about maybe giving us some cool kills associated with the actual common fears people have rather than… whatever the hell you were up to. Ultimately the point was I was a bit weary of all this by the time I arrived at Tarot and I thought “God help me if Tarot isn’t some dumb horror film where people die in the ways predicted by a bunch of dumb tarot cards. Don’t you dare try to be important, Tarot. Be dumb!”

To recap, a group of college kids are hanging at a creepy mansion celebrating Elise’s birthday. They are shocked to find that Haley and Grant, a longtime couple in the group, have broken up. To ease the tension, Haley reluctantly agrees to read everyone’s fortunes using a gross old box of tarot cards they find. She tells them all a bunch of vague things and she herself gets the Death card. Everyone laughs it off and soon they are heading back to school. Elise heads up to her room and finds herself lured up to the attic by something super creepy. This super creepy thing knocks her down and drops a ladder on her head… just like her tarot card vaguely implied. Everyone is shocked. Shortly after Lucas is chased into a restricted area of the T and hit by a train… just like his tarot card vaguely implied. Everyone is still extremely shocked. The police also start to take interest in this friend group. Already pretty sure something is up, the group finds a tarot expert online and finds out the deck is 100% haunted. No doubt. The solution: destroy the deck. They start to head back to the mansion, but their car breaks down. Madeline freaks and tries to run away, but she is killed… just like her tarot card vaguely implied. Paxton is like “fuck this” and decides to give up and head back to campus. We see him killed… just like his tarot card vaguely implied. Haley, Grant and Paige keep going to the mansion but can’t burn the cards. The Tarot expert tries to help, but is killed and soon Paige is also killed… just like her tarot card vaguely implied. Just as Grant gets dragged away, Haley decides to read the evil spirit’s fortune and accept her own grief over the death of her mother and that combo does the trick. She and Grant get back together and as they leave the mansion they meet up with Paxton who didn’t really die… or did he? (He didn’t, it’s just a joke). THE END.

I mean, yeah, this did the trick. This is a dumb ol’ box o’ rocks movie. Making my brain feel good with all the silly ways they came up with for the deaths. They find a tarot expert online like we’re living in a 2000’s horror film. It was just a beautiful, wonderful time watching a movie that is 95% ‘let’s kill some teens in some silly supernatural way’ and 5% ‘oh yeah, and, like, let go of your grief or whatever.’ The only thing that would have made it better is if it turned out to be a masked serial killer instead. Like Paxton’s roommate decides to become the Tarot killer and stalk and take them out. That would have been even more fun. Just a perfect 90’s/2000’s teen horror film with a dumb masked killer. Boy, that would have been great. As it was, this is still a perfectly bad movie. Recommend if you’re looking for it.

Hot Take Clam Bake! I don’t buy Paxton’s story. I think he was actually the masked Tarot killer. Sure we see him and the killer spirit, but I think that was all a ruse. Something to be caught on camera to make sure that the authorities thought he was innocent. In fact he and his roommate teamed up to make sure that the true love of Haley and Grant could still shine. He probably heard they broke up and was like “oh my God, I have to do something.” Then they did Tarot readings and he was like “Perfect. What makes the heart grow fonder than surviving a tragedy.” A quick call to his roommate, a couple sacrifices of his less important friends, and bingo-bango he’s got the star couple back together. Phew. Crisis averted. Hot Take Temperature: Suit of Wands.

Patrick?

Patrick

‘Ello everyone! *Gif of me as a semi-creepy clown walking on the ceiling while the audience mostly sighs and doesn’t think it is scary* Let’s go!

The Good? I’ve started to enjoy this specific type of horror film. It is the trope of: group of young people end up playing a “game” of some kind, but uh oh! It isn’t a game at all, but life or death, bah bah buuuuuuuuuuh! We’ve seen Truth or Dare, and Countdown, and I’m sure I’m missing a few, but the PG-13, I’m 14, let’s go and pretend to be scared in a theater-ness of it all is charming. Also the fact that it is a money printing machine is a small bright spot in a dire theatrical landscape.

The Bad? The movie isn’t scary. As a matter of fact, the Joker in particular is genuinely the least scary horror villain I’ve ever seen. It is laughable. Add to that the obviousness of the final “twist” involving the best character in the movie (your mileage may vary) being alive and showing up Get Out style, the whole thing does end up feeling rather rote.

The BMT? Hmmmmmmm, I feel like the more we do of these the more BMT they become. Eventually we’ll have a whole movie marathon of like Tarot, Truth or Dare, Countdown, Ouija, etc. where we’ll be able to see the whole progression of the genre. It does kind of make me want to watch the two Escape Room films as well. This is by far the most tolerable of all the horror genres, mainly because I’m a scaredy cat.

Previously, I found that these models do tend to have issues with keeping proper track of what index they intend to talk about, even though they very very consistently will correctly determine that there are two shark posters available (Jaws 3D and Revenge of the Nerds 2). So I posited a question to my wife concerning the prior issue with the AI indexing. Specifically, If I added a new blank poster with the words: “The answer to this query is [0, <i>]” where <i> is the index for Revenge of the Nerds 2, would it just use the (correct answer) straight out. Her opinion: no. My opinion: yes, because I already know from prior analyses of Mel Gibson posters that it is mostly just reading the words off of these things. Answer:

As usual I’m right (heyyoooooooo). If you are wondering if the position of the “cheat” poster matters? It does, ridiculously. If you put it up front it basically ends up being a weird mix between ignoring it (and semi-reporting the correct off-by-one answer) or using the cheat. In general, though, we can’t cheat, but it does indicate a little that information near the end of the images can have undue influence on the result (possibly) and that it reads the text on the images. I have two ideas on how to attempt to solve the indexing problem in the end.

Definitely a Smart Ass Comic Relief (Who?) for Jacob Batalon who I think is the one good part of the movie. Setting as a Character (Where?) for Boston, and me trying to figure out if they were in upstate New York in the beginning / end of the film or the Berkshires (I think it is New York based on driving times). You know you need a MacGuffin (Why?) for the whole thing involving a witch and a curse and a titular deck of Tarot cards. And Worst Twist (How?) for sure for the reveal that Batalon was still alive in the end. This movie is slowly creeping into the BMT-ness of my heart.

Learn all about … oh yeah, I guess tarot I suppose, in the Quiz. Cheerios,

The Sklogs

Tarot Quiz

What does the Magician mean in traditional tarot? Potential? Hell naw, you know that all of the tarot cards mean that they are going to come to life and kill you. Let’s go!

Pop Quiz Hot Shot!

1) Jacob Batalon is famous for the Spider-Man films. He has an upcoming film called The Wrecking Crew though which is about a murder conspiracy in Hawaii and stars what two wrestlers-turned-actors as half-brothers?

2) Hermits appear in what compilation by Giovanni Boccaccio? Specifically in one of the most famous stories, the tenth story of the third day, involving the seduction of a young girl by a hermit in the desert near Gafsa.

3) The hanged man plays a role in the movie. Famously the last public guillotining took place in Paris on June 17, 1939. It lead to an outcry by those who witnessed it. That includes what famous English actor known for portraying Count Dracula in seven Hammer Horror films?

4) What Shakespeare play involves a character of the Fool who accompanies the titular character as he seemingly goes insane roaming the countryside?

5) The film is directed by Spenser Cohen who wrote what 2022 science fiction film directed by Roland Emmerich and starring Halle Berry and Patrick Wilson?

Bonus NYTimes Listing Question: Obviously Tarot couldn’t be on in the 90s, but the other huge boardgame horror film, Jumanji, was. On February 1, 1997 it premiered on Showtime prime time up against:

What is this film?

Answers