Rambling Film

We're onto the second part of my four part series. Here I'm talking about a few films of this past decade that I felt deserved more attention.  Part 1 1) Kill Your Darlings I cannot stress enough just how wonderful the entire cast is in this film. There's quite a few films covering the beat generation but this one remains my favorite. Review 2) The Incredible Jessica James This is a more recent find for me, but with all the articles out there covering Netflix originals this film does not get talked about nearly enough It's amazing. Review 3) Una This is one of those films that under the right distributor, it would've been an awards vehicle for Rooney Mara and Ben Mendelsohn but instead went largely unnoticed. It's rather uncomfortable at times but it's so well done. Review 4) Laurence Anyways Remember when Xavier Dolan was all the rage on film twitter? If there's one film of his that still sticks with me, its this epic story abo...

The last love theme Wanderer has for the month is reserved for the small screen. Here are some shows I enjoy that romance was a main topic. 1) Euphoria This is one of my favorite series that debuted in 2019. Euphoria is about growing up in gen Z, and along with that comes crushes, curiosity, and love. I think this show does a wonderful job of giving us a peek into what it's like to be a teenager today. 2) True Blood This is a very sexy show and Sookie and Eric is the best romance in it. No, I'm not taking any other opinions. This is a fact. 3) The Mindy Project I didn't watch every episode of this, but the entire premise was about Mindy's dating life and I did enjoy the episodes I saw.

My life in pictures. Michael (LaKeith Stanfield) is a reporter from New York City doing a story in Louisiana. While interviewing Isaac (Rob Morgan) he notices a photograph of Christina (Chanté Adams) on his mantelpiece. Christina was a photographer who recently passed away leaving behind Mae (Issa Rae) an art curator who also lives in NYC.  Michael tracks her down to learn more about Christina's work. It turns out Mae is also trying to learn more about her mother's past.  Have you ever seen a movie where every single actor in it is SO good looking it's almost a bit distracting? That's my first thought about The Photograph. Everyone in this movie just looks *good.* Being a big fan of LaKeith Stanfield I knew immediately after I saw the trailer that I would definitely be seeing this. I think this is a wonderful date movie. It's not just about Mae and Michael's relationship. It's about the loves of Christina's life as well. There's many ...

In continuing on with my decade posts, I thought it would be fun to talk about the Oscars. Yes, I know, we just got through that, but here we are again. January and February are slow content months, y'all. These a few performances from the 2010-2019 Oscar seasons that should've gotten more love. I'm bound to miss some, some don't forget to chime in with your favorites Best Actor - Ryan Gosling in Blue Valentine Was it fair that Michelle Williams got that coveted nomination, when her counterpart who was there every step of the way did not? No. It wasn't. 2010 was a stacked year, arguably the most competitive so Gosling was shut out, but I truly felt he deserved a place. Best Actress - Adepero Oduye in Pariah I realize no one saw this movie so it was never on anyone's radar but Oduye is so devastatingly good and was Albert Nobbs really more Oscar Worthy than this? No. Best Actor - Michael Fassbender in Shame The only excuse for his lack of nomin...

Every year when the Independent Spirit Awards are announced I make it a point to drop as many of the nominees as I can into both of my Netflix queues to see what I've missed. Lucky for me, there were a few nominees readily available for me to check out. Here are a few quick reviews. A couple of these are not Spirit Award nominees, but they were in the current conversation so I put them here too. I meant to have this post up before the actual Spirit Awards aired, but time got away from me.  The Mustang  Nominations: Best Actor in a Leading Role, Best First Feature Matthias Schoenaerts was indeed very good and a wild Jason Mitchell appeared for a few minutes which was a nice surprise, but I found this to be unbearably boring. I just can't do horse movies. I felt similar to Lean on Pete last year. Something about horses just puts me to sleep. C- Atlantics Nominations: None While this one technically didn't get any Spirit nominations, I added it to my que...

This week's theme from Wandering Through the Shelves is about love in the tech age. I stretched this theme a bit. My favorite techy movies have love in them, but only one pick has it as a main focal point. Here are three movies where technology played into love. 1) Her I think this movie will be popular. Theo falls in love with his operating system, Samantha. It's one of my favorite movies and so beautiful. 2) Chatroom This film is about teens in a chatroom, and it's staged in a way where it looks like they are sitting in a hotel room talking to each other. There isn't a central romance between characters, but one of the teens, Emily feels unloved by her parents. It's a very clever film with an amazing cast. 3) Searching This film is shot entirely on computer screens, tablets and phones. While the plot is about a father looking for his missing daughter - why did that daughter go missing? Because a boy fell in love with her and catfished her. 

Sometimes that awkwardness never leaves you. Sarah (Alison Brie) is a socially awkward woman working at an arts and craft store. She spends time binge watching her favorite supernatural crime show over and over, visiting the horse she used to ride as a child much to the owner's chagrin, but more recently she's been having strange dreams and nose bleeds. She eventually starts to question her reality. This film reminded me a lot of Safety Not Guaranteed . It's a quirky story that eventually gets weird. Very weird. In fact, I'm not sure what exactly the writers were going for by the end if it. I want to assume they knew exactly what they wanted their movie to be, but the way it translated on screen felt aloof and kind of messy. That's not to say it's bad, in fact, I liked a lot of Horse Girl . It really didn't start feeling jumbled until the ending. I expected something a little closer to the horse girl stereotype I'm familiar with but that...

What I knew going in: I had seen parts of it on TV before. Spike Lee's sprawling epic follows the legendary activist Malcolm Little (Denzel Washington) from his gangster days, his prison sentence, and his eventual rebirth in the Nation of Islam before becoming what we know him as now - Malcolm X.  I realize now why I probably never saw this all in one sitting. This movie is three and a half hours long. I must have known that at some point but when I went to start this film on Netflix it came as quite a surprise.  To tell Malcolm X's entire story, I think the length is justified. There's just so much and you really can't leave out certain parts of it if you want the big picture. I think Spike Lee did a great job of containing everything and an amazing performance by Denzel Washington helped as well. One of the things I always want from a biopic is a teaching moment. I liked that this film gave me a better understanding of his journey. In history, especially f...

This week's theme from Wandering Through The Shelves follows the "meet cute" trope. I'm not going to lie, I had to look this up. I've never heard this term before. It seems obvious in hindsight but Meet Cute is "characters that meet under cute circumstances." So here are a few films I enjoy where that happens. 1) La La Land Mia and Sebastian have a bad run in at the club, but their official meeting at a garden party where Mia makes his band play I Ran is about as cute as it gets. 2) 5 to 7 Brian and Arielle have an adorably awkward first meeting while smoking cigarettes and begin an affair that can only last between 5 and 7 pm.  Did I mention Arielle's husband has a mistress too? This is a great film, and I highly recommend. Especially if you're an Anton Yelchin fan.  3) (500) Days of Summer This isn't about how Tom meets Summer, but how he meets his likely eventual girlfriend. In the lobby at a job interview that they...