Hey there Sofa Taters, I mean FilmRunners! We have another exciting week coming up! This week we have Mason and Larissa from Turn and Smile joining us and the infamous sommelier Maria Banson from the Brunello Bombshell finishing off her guest spot with a couple of reviews. Mason and Larissa are a couple of fellow Canadians from the opposite coast, but I’ll let them give us the rundown on who they are:
Turn And Smile is a TV criticism and commentary publication on Substack, run by longtime friends Mason (as in the jar) and Larissa (who doesn’t have a quirky mnemonic device).
Turn And Smile is a passion project that is a safe space for all TV lovers—who they call their Sofa Taters—that is part TV appreciation, part media criticism, and part inadvertent obligatory social commentary, with a dash of comedy and a pinch of existential dread.
If you like Turn And Smile’s reviews with Film Runner, be sure to check them out for their regularly scheduled TV content every Sunday and Thursday, where they’ll deliver it to you with a turn… and a smile!
You can find their substacks below:
Last but not least, Maria also took the time to share her famous wine-and-movie pairings for last week’s picks:
Network (1976)
Picked By
Mason and Larissa
Synopsis
A television network cynically exploits a deranged former anchor's ravings and revelations about mass media for its own profit, but finds that his message may be difficult to control. IMDB
Director
Starring
Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch
Runtime
2 hours and 1 minute.
Trailer
Why
We’re really glad that you’re asking this, because it’s actually something we put a lot of thought into.
When we were originally approached for this collaboration, Larissa was the first to see the message and looked across the room to Mason (who was visiting for a weekly editorial meeting) and told him the news. We can’t remember Mason’s first suggestion; it might have been the Jake Kadsen film The TV Set, but regardless, he had an instant idea of a film to cover. We were in agreement very early on that we wanted to review something that related in some way to TV, because we are billing ourselves as TV critics, and if we’re going around doing reviews of Michael Bay’s latest vanity project or covering whatever tonally confusing snore-fest Zack Snyder has churned out, then we might as well be as much TV critics as c'est un tuyau.
So we sat down and really discussed it. We consulted Google for some options, and then we read a synopsis of Network.
At first unfamiliar with it, we quickly realized that we had been seeing a viral clip from the movie make the rounds on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram; it was a well-travelled clip. But we had not seen it in its entirety, and we almost couldn’t believe that it would be at all relatable to us today. How many of the issues being discussed in movies and on TV could be relevant to modern audiences?! Surely Network and Archie Bunker couldn’t be relevant to millenials and Gen Z(ed)?! Surely we’ve fixed those problems in the last fifty years?!
Network is modern life, and we wanted to take the opportunity Film Runner afforded us to share it, because we’re all mad as hell, and we hope we’re not going to take it anymore.
Palm Springs (2023)
Picked By
Jake
Synopsis
Nyles and Sarah find themselves stuck in a time loop and living the same day over and over again. They are drawn to each other, but certain revelations threaten their budding romance. IMDB
Director
Starring
Andy Samberg, Cristin Milioti, J.K. Simmons
Runtime
1 hour and 30 minutes.
Trailer
Why
I don’t have any deep reasons for picking this film. One of my goals for club is to have a wide range of genres represented and you may have noticed from my picks so far that rom-coms are absent. I hadn’t heard of the director before, but I am a fan of both Andy Samberg and Cristin Milioti. Throw in some Covid lockdown based nihilism with a twist on the time-loop trope and I’m down.
🎥 Reviews of Last Week's Picks
Caution, there may be spoilers.
American Psycho (2000)
Picked By
Maria Banson
Synopsis
A wealthy New York City investment banking executive, Patrick Bateman, hides his alternate psychopathic ego from his co-workers and friends as he delves deeper into his violent, hedonistic fantasies. IMDB
Director
Starring
Christian Bale, Justin Theroux, Josh Lucas
Runtime
1 hour and 42 minutes.
Trailer
Guest Review
When American Psycho (2000) was first released, the press went crazy for a movie that was “sourced from a novel by a misogynist, but directed by a feminist”. Truer words could not be spoken, and the cautionary tale that is the movie version of American Psycho has only become more real over time.
Stylish? Check. (Even though there were many major fashion houses that refused to lend clothes for the movie, this is undeniably an ode to late 80s “fame and excess” fashion.)
Killer screenplay? Check. The movie is perfectly paced, and audiences are gently guided to fall in love with Patrick Bateman before absolutely detesting him. And audiences go along for the rollercoaster ride of Bateman’s full rise and rapid descent into madness over the course of 1 hour and 42 minutes - the perfect run time!
Director Mary Harron (The Notorious Bettie Page, I Shot Andy Warhol) manages to take one of literature’s most famous antiheroes and turn him into a tongue-in-cheek pop culture icon. The way that Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) is depicted as an insecure bottom feeder wearing a brandless watch as his colleagues sported Rolexes could only have been orchestrated by a person who knows a thing or two about being delegated to the bottom rung while more privileged classmates seemingly have the world handed to them (by the way, the Rolex deal specifically stated that everyone except Patrick Bateman could wear their watches on screen).
It’s a genre-defining tour de force of a film that is finally getting its due 25 years after the fact. But if American Psycho walked so that The Substance (2024) could run? Horror movies, and the film industry, are in great hands going forward.
Jake’s Review
⭐⭐⭐⭐ (four stars)
This was another re-watch for me, and I am stunned by how well it holds up as a feminist satire. Its depiction of Wall Street’s vapidness, toxic masculinity, and bland consumerism is top-notch. Harron and her co-writer, Guinevere Turner, knocked it out of the park with this one.
On my first watch-through, I found myself picking up on it quickly but greatly overestimated the extent to which Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale) was an unreliable narrator. Upon second viewing, I realized just how shallow and thin he and his colleagues really were. No one has real opinions outside of greed and disgust (Bateman to the extreme). I’d argue every single opinion they have, beyond their own narrow world, is regurgitated from some newspaper or magazine article they’ve read at some point.
They routinely mistake each other for one another, often insulting a colleague to their face while believing they’re speaking to someone else. This leads them to continuously cover for one another and provide alibis right up until the end of the film. It’s not that I didn’t notice they were shallow before; it’s just that they mix each other up in such a natural, casual way that I didn’t catch the extent of it the first time through. This misidentification gives you some of the only real, solid insights into how Bateman truly appears to others. One of my favorite quotes in the movie comes from the beginning, at the end of his morning routine:
There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman. Some kind of abstraction. But there is no real me. Only an entity. Something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours, and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable, I simply am not there.
Patrick may be the extreme embodiment of this, but it applies to every colleague to varying degrees.
Women in American Psycho, as largely seen through the lens of Bateman, are simply goods and services to be used to satisfy his own desires. There is no emotional connection. When he is done with them, he disposes of them (if they are unlucky, quite literally). It is objectification taken to the extreme.
Going into this, I didn’t realize how much depth this film had. Having watched it a second time, I now realize I could probably watch it several more times and still discover more. Great film.
Arrival (2016)
Picked By
Jake
Synopsis
Linguist Louise Banks leads a team of investigators when gigantic spaceships touch down around the world. As nations teeter on the verge of global war, Banks and her crew must find a way to communicate with the extraterrestrial visitors. IMDB
Director
Starring
Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker
Runtime
1 hour and 56 minutes.
Trailer
Guest Review
Wow. I wasn’t expecting to be this taken by a science fiction film based on an existential short story, but here we are.
Arrival (2016) is a gentle giant of a movie made for skeptics, lovers, intellectuals, and extroverts alike. For those who know next to nothing about the movie other than aliens and Amy Adams are involved (slowly raises hand), Arrival proves to be a meaty, textured masterpiece of a movie with something to capture the imagination of a wide group of people.
Director Denis Villeneuve (Dune, Blade Runner 2049) is an expert at atmospheric world building in his movies, and Arrival manages to make the otherworldly elements both grounded in some sort of realism and literally larger than life. There’s always a tone of bittersweet, hazy melancholy in Villeneuve’s movies that is heightened and even hazier here with cinematographer Bradford Young (funny enough, the same cinematographer who shot A Most Violent Year).
As Louise Banks, the grieving linguist lacking a sense of direction when aliens land on Earth, Amy Adams shines with a quiet strength and warmth - one of her all-time great performances, and my personal favorite Amy Adams performance since Doubt (2008). Jeremy Renner proves to be a thoughtful scene partner to Amy Adams, offering a welcome voice of support as Ian Donnelly. Academy Award winner Forest Whitaker’s take on Colonel Weber imbues the movie with structure and a good foil for the idealistic linguists.
For a movie that was seen in its season as a below-the-line technical juggernaut, there’s a lot of heart and beautiful work from all areas of production. Watch Arrival when you need to be reminded of humanity’s inherent goodness, and you’ll be rewarded with a movie to make you think, feel, and appreciate the world in a new light.
Jake’s Review
⭐⭐⭐⭐ (four stars)
This was a hard one for me to watch, not because the film was bad (far from it), but because my daughter had a particularly busy week and ended up watching it in six or seven sittings. As a result, I missed some crucial plot points that I had to go back and figure out. I also had to keep the volume down for the majority of film, so I missed out on a lot of the sound as well. Ah well, c’est la vie.
Having said, that let’s talk about what was great. First, Amy Adams did a stellar job. She carried the entire film on her shoulders. I consider her not getting nominated for an Academy Award a real snub.
Villeneuve crafted an atmospheric, moody, and thoughtful film. While I often find that from 2000 onwards, sci-fi films have a tendency toward cool, desaturated tones, this, to me, can feel overly sterile or impersonal. Arrival is an exception. The shots in particular featuring the shell are stunning and disorienting. Villeneuve and his cinematographer Bradford Young contrast this coldness with a warmer palette in the flashbacks. This back and forth between coolness and warmth creates room for a lot of emotional depth.
Overall, I thought it was excellent. I’ll definitely have to give it another watch when I have time, because it’s a film that truly deserves your full attention.
🖋 Closing Note
Thanks for reading!
For more content about films across different mediums, please check out The First Picture House.
If you enjoyed this and haven’t subscribed yet, please consider subscribing below. For those who have subscribed, we’ll see you in two weeks with our thoughts on this week’s picks and some fresh recommendations!
 | A guest post by
|
 | A guest post by
|
Wooo!! Super excited for the upcoming episode!! 😀👏
American Psycho is an amazing pick! Great reviews!! One cool factoid about the movie was Mary Harron had Willem Dafoe embody different emotions in each take of his scenes. For example, in one take he says his lines like he has full confidence in Patrick, another where he is suspicious of Patrick, etc. Later in editing, she mixed up his takes, so the audience is never fully sure what the detective is thinking, and Patrick’s anxieties might be true. Very cool movie.