Alex's 2024 Weekly Cinema Corner: Week of January 22nd

Alex Schlerf
Jan 28, 2024
8 min read

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 22nd, 2024: Dream Scenario(Directed by Kristoffer Borgli)

Rating: 3.5/5 Stars

Definitely a very cool and interesting Nicholas Cage movie, just a little too weird at points for me. Going to try to avoid spoilers for this review, but there's a somewhat sexual scene in the middle of the movie that just feels so out of character for everyone involved. They try to build some tension between him in his wife in the first hour of the film and I feel like it just isn't natural. When the main characters in this movie make actions relating to the consequences of that "tension", I just find it hard to believe they would actually act in the way they did. However, there are a lot of positives as well. The way they crafted all the dreams was really creative and I'm glad they leaned into the horror aspect. The concept is something I never thought would be able to actually be made into a long-form movie. A24 always hits with these random concepts and I'm glad they serve as a vessel for these smaller films. Would recommend for anyone who can handle a couple weird scenes that will definitely feel somewhat unnecessary.

January 25th, 2024: Mission Impossible(Directed by Brian De Palma)

Rating: 4.5/5 Stars

I am now starting my first time watching the entire Mission Impossible franchise; besides the most recent one which I watched in theaters last year. I enjoyed that film a decent bit, so I put it 1-6 on my list and now I'm finally getting around to it. This film is fantastic. It clearly reinvented the genre at the time, with so many action tropes that we see in almost every action movie nowadays. I think I can confidently say that Tom Cruise is the absolute best person to play this role. His performance is iconic and I'm glad it doesn't fall to some classic action hero tropes. For example, there's not really a love interest for him in the entire movie. I guess it's implied that he and Claire have a little something going, but it's all off screen so it's not really in your head at all. I know it's been said a million times before, but the MI theme is so iconic and seriously plays off the action scenes so well. The scene where they are attempting to retrieve the list out of the heavily guarded room is probably my favorite in the whole movie just because how much they build up the tension. If you want a tutorial on how to build tension in an action movie, just watch this film. Also special shoutout to Ving Rhames as Luther, just an awesome character that you find rooting for the second you see him. I have no idea where the franchise is going to go from here, but this was certainly a great start.

Currently Watching: Welcome To Wrexham Season 2

There's not much I can say about this show because I'm only a few episodes in, but I can formulate a little based off the first season. I just love everything about the concept. I was expecting the entire show to just circulate entirely around Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney building up the club from scratch, following them as the season plays out. That is certainly a big part of it, but them actually dedicating the majority of the show to the history of Wrexham and some of the players stories was such a good choice. It helps you not only root for the club because two Hollywood stars own it, but also because of the rich history of the club and the genuinely wholesome stories of the actual members of the club or the various fans in the small Welsh town. It already seems like this is being continued for the second season, with the first episode mostly focusing on the King of England arriving in Wrexham but also a second episode focused on members around the club that deal with autism. It's a genuine tear jerker and I just love that this city got to have their story told. Again I'm only a few episodes in so I'll try to put a decent dent in it over the next week and check back in next Sunday!

Onto The Cinema News Section...(Oscar Nominees Edition)

I just wanted to take a second to acknowledge how insanely stacked this category is. The name recognition is enough in itself, but all the performances are so fantastic in different ways. Ryan Gosling plays one of the most ridiculous characters in cinema history and makes it great. Robert Downey Jr. plays a character that we've never really seen him play before but he approaches it with such care and makes it one of the best performances in his career. Robert De Niro playing a villain is something that I need to see more of. Sterling K. Brown has been unreal in just about everything he's been in and his chemistry with Jeffrey Wright is really felt in this somewhat strange flick. I'll admit that I haven't seen Poor Things yet, but everything I've seen in promotion shows that Mark Ruffalo plays a completely brutal and villainous character that has so many little intricacies to it. These are five actors that have long been acknowledged in their career but still reinventing themselves as time goes on. It's just something that's really cool to think about past the inevitable complaining that happens on Oscar Nominations day.

I'll save you from my complaining for just one more piece of recognition for Emily Blunt. She's only 40 years old so she has plenty of time left in her career for more great performances, but I'm glad she finally got her recognition after so many years of being snubbed. There is a question of if she'll win or not; regardless, it's nice to see a first time nomination for a very notable name. She doesn't really have that many scenes in Oppenheimer, but whenever she does it's so striking and genuinely takes you back. I think because of her lack of scenes she wasn't really getting as much recognition as some of the other actors in the film, so it's great for her to finally get it. In a bevy of amazing performances in the likely Best Picture winner at this year's Oscars, Blunt's is definitely up there with one of the best.

I promise I won't talk about Spider-Man Across The Spider Verse in every single column. In fact, this will probably be the last one for a while. However, I just do not understand the Academy's decision to not nominate it for Best Original Score. There's some good ones on the list: Oppenheimer and Poor Things(again, haven't seen but have heard good things) particularly stand out. But... Indiana Jones and The Dial Of Destiny? American Fiction? I thought both film soundtracks were just okay, not terrible, but seriously? Even if you didn't enjoy Across The Spider Verse as much as me, I think everyone who watched the film can admit how amazing the soundtrack is. As mentioned last week, Spider-Gwen's theme is just amazing and the music that plays in the final two minutes is iconic. I couldn't tell you why American Fiction is there, but the selection of Indiana Jones is clearly a legacy selection. John Williams has been nominated a billion times for the Oscars and his Indiana Jones theme is one of the most iconic in the history of cinema. It's still that in the most recent installment, but there's just no way you can look at me with a straight face and tell me it's better then the Across The Spider Verse score. Just a monumental snub and clearly shows how little The Oscars values animated media. I also don't see how it wasn't nominated for Best Picture and if you want to see the reasons, just read my review from last week.

I don't necessarily need to focus on any of these films in particular but I just wanted to acknowledge how sad it is every year to see amazing films get no recognition at the biggest awards event of the year. Sometimes it's not even to the fault of the film. The Iron Claw, for example, probably would've been on the minds of The Academy more if they didn't have a December release. The Super Mario Bros Movie and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem are exactly what they needed to be but don't exactly fit into one category. Smaller films like All Of Us Strangers, Origin and Priscilla just don't have that name brand recognition to get it pushed into any specific category. Even a movie like John Wick 4, which was one of my favorite movies of 2023, just kind of got boxed out by a crowded year of action movies and the fact that it can't really get shortlisted for many categories. You get the idea. Sometimes there's just an abundance of good films in a year and there's going to be some that get snubbed. Maybe Zac Efron or Keanu Reaves isn't going to mind not being nominated for an Oscar, but I'm sure this kind of stuff is very important for smaller actors. A lot of the movies on that list are great and you should still watch them regardless of them getting snubbed by a silly awards show!