Alex's 2024 Weekly Cinema Corner: Week of January 15th

Before you read I know the question you all have... "am I on the right website?". "Rouge Eye SPORTS having an article about cinema?".

I assure you, there has been no typo in your search or no issue in your hyperlink.

Although sports has always been the main focus of this brand and honestly, my life, movies/television has become another massive passion in the past year or so. In 2023, I dove right into the world of cinema and was able to reach a deeper appreciation like I've never had before. It was a whole new avenue of enjoyment for me and allowed me to connect with a lot of new people. I'm glad I picked up this interest again and I plan on continuing it even more in 2024.

'Alex's Weekly 2024 Cinema Corner'  will consist of my thoughts on every bit of movie and television I watched in the past week, what I'm currently in the middle of watching(if anything) and some short thoughts on some movie news from the past seven days.

As I was hinting at earlier, I do have two rating apps that allow me to keep up with what I watch. My letterboxd account is aps12359 and my serializd account is alexschlerf. These will have every movie or TV show I've rated, ever, and also some lists beyond the ones I share here. Feel free to follow and keep up the discussion past this article! As always, comments on this article and on Twitter/X are open if you want to peacefully debate about anything I say!

Lastly, just please don't get mad if I don't rate your favorite movie five stars or don't talk about a bit of news that you read from the past week. The beauty of cinema is that everyone can enjoy certain aspects in different ways; the reason why we don't all have the exact same opinion on everything. This is MY column, meaning it will end up leaning towards the movies/TV shows that are on my list and the movie news that appeals to me the most. Let's just all have fun.

January 19th, 2024: They Cloned Tyrone(Directed by Juel Taylor)

Credit: Netflix

Rating: 3.5/5 Stars

It's just a fun little movie to watch after a long day of work. John Boyega, Teyonah Parris and Jamie Foxx are a fantastic trio of actors. I had known all of them from other individual projects, but seeing them all coming together in this film was a delight. I never really watch these comedy/sci-fi/mystery type movies, but I'm thinking I need to see more now because I really enjoyed the concept. It's certainly not perfect- the plot is really confusing at times. I understand all of it now, but it took a lot of google searching and re-winding the film to fully grasp the concept. I also think some of the comedy felt way too forced at the beginning and they were just trying to win you over in the first 10-15 minutes. It got A LOT better as it went on. Jamie Foxx made me laugh at basically every line he delivered which is expected at this point from one of my favorite actors of all time. Him as a overconfident pimp works incredibly well. Boyega really needs to be in more projects because he's such a good actor. HIs ability to play all those different versions of himself at the end of the film was a really impressive showing of acting. I certainly would recommend this movie and it was definitely a very enjoyable watch.

January 21st, 2024: Spider-Man Across the Spider Verse(Rewatch)(Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Justin K. Thompson, Kemp Powers)

Credit: Netflix

Rating: 5/5 Stars

I usually won't cite rewatches in this column, but this is a week where I only watched one project and it's an excuse to talk about one of my favorite movies of all time. In fact I'm writing this before I've even rewatched the movie, but I've now seen the film around 15 times so I think it'll be relatively easy to formulate a review. The movie is re-releasing in theaters for a week and I'm going on Sunday to see it. Obviously there will be spoilers in this review.

This film is a masterpiece from start to finish. It's one of the most amazing first-time watching movie experiences I've ever had. I was so invested in the film that it feels like I blinked and it was over. I had heard before I watched that there would be a cliffhanger at the end, but I was so into the movie that when it happened I was completely shocked. Immediately when I left the theater I knew this movie would find itself into my top 10 all time, but the more I watched it the more I just completely fell in love. By the time it left theaters, it had easily solidified its spot at #2 on my all time favorite movies list.

I could talk about this movie for hours. It would probably take a 5 hour video essay to touch on even half of the points that I need to showcase how amazing the film is. I'll try to touch on the best here.

I think my favorite part of the film is Spider-Gwen's (voiced by Hailee Steinfield) character arc. That ends up being sort of a funny detail because it's not even completed yet, there's another whole film that will be coming out at some point soon that will hash it out fully. The opening 10-15 minutes that focus on her universe are seriously amazing, complete with beautiful animation and a wonderful theme. The way they are able to put such a focus in her action scenes on the basis of her ballet/band background is simply perfect. Steinfeld is the MVP of this movie and I cannot wait to see how Gwen's character grows even more in Beyond The Spider Verse.

The scene with Miles and Gwen on the clocktower is the best scene in the entire movie and is probably my favorite moment from any comic book movie I've ever seen. The scene perfectly showcases the characters of Miles and Gwen while pulling on your heartstrings. It's the sad reality of the character of Spider-Man across all media: he/she will always have something in the way of true love. Not going to call anyone out, but some Spider-Man stories over the years have struggled to find that balance of having the web slinger be the quipy teenager and still suffer from pain or loss in his/her life. This finds the exact balance needed, with MIles and Gwen both accepting that reality and cherishing the moment they have together.

There's too much good to even be able to list in one article. Jonathan Schwartzman turning a D-List villian in The Spot into a menace who serves an actual embodiment of Miles' journey. Making Miles' family a genuine factor to his story and characters we root for more than anyone else. The filmmakers creating the tension with not only action but also slow scenes with two characters just talking. Daniel Kaluuya as Hobie feeling like an enemy to us at first but turning into a defender of Miles and someone who helps Gwen get the team together at the end. Peter B. Paker, voiced by Jake Johnson, is barely in this movie but his scenes really matter and show how far he's come since we saw him in the beginning of the previous film. God, those last 15 minutes? I still feel the tension even after seeing this movie in the double digits. From MIles telling his Mom he's Spider-Man, to then slowly learning he's in the wrong reality, to then "reuniting" with his uncle, to seeing the mural of his dead father, to meeting Prowler MIles, to Gwen recruiting the team together and that glimmer of hope where we can see Miles is about to escape. I could literally give you 100 more perfect details.

This movie could have just been a cameo fest and/or a cash grab. With all the Spider-Man properties at their disposal, it would have been easy to throw some random, I don't know, Venom cameo into the film and try to shoehorn him into the plot because it may put some extra butts in the seats. But these filmmakers trust their audience and they know that if they make a story that's true to the character, it will turn out better than anyone could have expected. That's exactly what happened.

This movie transcends any movie released in the genre and I don't see how it'll ever be topped. But knowing the people behind it, they'll go even bigger and better for Beyond The Spider Verse. I could watch this movie every single day for the next year and I still wouldn't get tired of it. If you somehow haven't tuned in yet, go ahead and get that done.

Best Picture nomination coming soon.

Onto the Cinema News Section...

This tweet just has three separate fantastic news pieces wrapped into one. First, the MCU Daredevil series is finally resuming production on Monday after a complete creative overhaul of the show was announced a couple months ago. Second, the show is directed by the minds behind the Loki show and written by the man behind The Punisher show. These are two of the best Marvel shows we've ever gotten, so to see them be the people working on Daredevil is certainly promising. Lastly, both the actors for Foggy and Karen from the original Daredevil show will be returning for the MCU version. Henson and Ann Wolf's characters were some of the absolute best parts of the previous installment and having them return only makes sense. There were rumors that before the creative overhaul, the two weren't involved and there was even going to be a mention of them being killed off screen. So not only has this overhaul made the original show canon, but it's bringing back some of our favorites. The previous show clearly wasn't touching the gritty roots of the original so I'm glad Kevin Feige took a step back and realized something needed to be changed. You just can't mess up this character and expect to get any die-hard fans on your side. After seeing that little tease of Daredevil in Echo and now this, I'm really starting to get optimistic about Daredevil Born Again.

I want to preface this by saying I absolutely love Invincible and I cannot wait to watch the second half of season 2 when it comes out. But, really? Not only have we waited for over a month since the final episode of the FIRST HALF of Season 2 came out, we are now supposed to get hyped up over waiting another week just for a release date drop. I'm not entitled to this stuff either- I'll wait however long I need to if it means the SECOND HALF will be as good as what we've had so far. My point is that it just seems like a bad marketing scheme. There was so much hype week-by-week when the first half of the season was releasing and now that hype has really died off since we've waited a month without any real time frame of when we'll see more. If they tell us it's coming out in mid-Febuary, for example, are they going to be able to market enough in that time to make sure it gets good first day ratings? I'll still be watching, but I'm not sure you'll pull in many non-diehard viewers immediately. Not to mention some people may just wait until the whole thing comes out before watching the second season? Just seems like this whole thing is being handled in a silly way.

Alright, I love The Polar Express more than the next guy, but why are we doing this? Was there any real ask for a sequel? What is the plot even going to be? Will the voice actors from the previous film want to return? Will they be able to capture the old animation style with all the new technology that has been released since the original was made? I just have so many questions and it really makes me wonder if this sequel ever really comes out. Sure, if the trailers and marketing look interesting I'll definitely give it a shot whenever it does release. I just feel like this is only going to end by upsetting all the people that love the original. I really hope it's good, but as of right now with the little detail we know it feels like a complete cash grab.

There's a lot of good TV shows every year. It's felt that there's been a lot of competition at the Emmy's recently and maybe this shouldn't really come as a shock that a certain show is boxed out. However, Better Call Saul is too amazing to not win a single time. I think the show doesn't start off as well as Breaking Bad, but the final couple seasons have content that is as good if not better than the "first" installment. If you don't agree that the show is anything special, how can you deny the acting performances? Bob Odenkirk, Rhea Seehorn, Jonathan Banks, Patrick Fabian, Giancarlo Esposito and many others put on performances that you simply don't see in any other show. Odenkirk feels particularly snubbed himself. He never really got the chance to truly shine in Breaking Bad, but he shows he can really act in this show. This isn't just some throwaway awards show, these things are really important to actors and crew. It can help the actors get looked at for certain roles and it can allow members of the crew to be eyed for other large production projects. I don't have the time to look through who they lost to all 53 times they lost, but I know there's some bad snubs in there and it's just really disappointing to see. I hope social media can help shine a positive light on this show and it'll spread the good word about all the goodness inside all the seasons. Do better, awards voters. It just makes me incredibly nervous for the Oscar nominations next week. Don't screw it up people.

To finish, here's the film and television projects that I are next on my list.

Next Movie On My List: Dream Scenario

Next TV Show On My List: Welcome to Wrexham Season 2

See you next Sunday!