comedy – Page 2 – PopCult Reviews

Patron Pick – Anora

This special reward is available to Patreon patrons who pledge at the $10 or $20 monthly levels. Each month, those patrons will pick a film for me to review. If they choose, they also get to include some of their thoughts about the movie. This Pick comes from Matt Harris.

Anora (2024)
Written and directed by Sean Baker

Of Sean Baker’s films that I have seen (Tangerine, The Florida Project, Red Rocket, and this one), it is pretty clear he has an interest in sex workers. More specifically, Baker is fascinated with the class politics of being a sex worker. It is a job where the class divide is screamingly evident every second of the transaction. In this way, sex work is one field of labor that highlights the contradictions in the United States, where lies are fed to us from birth about the “American Dream” and meritocracy. It is also very important to Baker that these characters be presented as human beings so that the audience sees the desperation of our protagonists to escape their economic lot in life. He also doesn’t fear these characters being deeply flawed and often unlikable.

Movie Review – Celine and Julie Go Boating

Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974)
Written by Jacques Rivette, Dominique Labourier, Juliet Berto, Eduardo de Gregorio, Bulle Ogier, and Marie-France Pisier
Directed by Jacques Rivette

I’ve noticed certain films rising in popularity, likely due to a recent restoration release. After decades of only existing in poor copies, we now have cleaned-up versions, so the films can be appreciated how their creators intended. Celine and Julie Go Boating is one of those films I see coming across MovieTok or being discussed online. I added it to this list because I was curious about what drew people to the picture. Jacques Rivette is a filmmaker whose work I am fairly unfamiliar with, but he came up with the New Wave filmmakers as a writer/critic at La Cahiers du Cinéma. I knew very little about this film other than it was very improvisational.

Patron Pick – Pootie Tang

Pootie Tang (2001)
Written and directed by Louis C.K.

Let’s talk about Louis C.K. For a few years in the 2010s, this stand-up comedian had hit the big time. He had a hit TV series on FX that allowed him to play creatively with the format and even push the line between comedy, drama, and absurdism. After about a decade of success, the allegations came out. Multiple women accused C.K. of sexual harassment and inappropriate behavior over many years in several different settings. His main proclivity seemed to be pleasuring himself in front of women without their consent. These women were either comedians trying to break out or crew on the set of shows C.K. worked on. His career has never quite recovered, though he still has plenty of celebrity comedian buddies backing him up. Before all of that, he created the character of Pootie Tang for the Chris Rock Show.

Patron Pick – Babes

Babes (2024)
Written by Ilana Glazer and Josh Rabinowitz
Directed by Pamela Adlon

I went into this film with not the highest of expectations. I wanted to enjoy it, though. Ilana Glazer was hilarious on Comedy Central’s Broad City, though I haven’t been incredibly impressed with her work outside of that series. Pamela Adlon is an actress I’ve enjoyed the performances of, from voicing Bobby Hill to her more recent live-action turns. Better Things, her now-concluded FX show, is on my TV list to watch from beginning to end. All this to say, I wanted to give Babes a fair show, but my god, this is one of the worst films I have seen in a very long time. It has me reeling about how infantile media made for adults is becoming in the States, but maybe it’s always been like this, and I’m just perceiving it now.

PopCult Podcast – Halloween Spooktacular 2024

Frankencows, J-Horror, Little Wednesday, and the Sanderson Sisters are all here to make this Halloween a scare of a good time.

Movie Review – Killer Klowns From Outer Space

Killer Klowns From Outer Space (1988)
Written and directed by the Chiodo Brothers

The Chiodo Brothers (Stephen, Charles, and Edward) had been absorbed by making movie special effects since they were kids. They had worked in the industry for a few years, selling their skills to productions like Critters, Faerie Tale Theater, and UHF. One of their most well-known works was the Large Marge effect in Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure. Puppets, stop motion, make-up, they loved it all. Ironically, in their first feature film, most of the special effects work was done by other artists they had befriended over the years. The Chiodos spent most of their time directing, producing, and playing some Killer Klowns. The result is that the film is less interested in the plot and more about the spectacle of the movies.

PopCult Podcast – Robot Dreams/Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

A lonely New Yorker mail orders a companion but a series of complications split them apart and they dream of being reunited. A woman haunted by strange encounters in her adolescence returns to the old house where it all started.

Movie Review – From Beyond

From Beyond (1986)
Written by Brian Yuzna, Dennis Paoli, and Stuart Gordon
Directed by Stuart Gordon

Stuart Gordon was a well-regarded name in American horror cinema, particularly in the 1980s. Born in Chicago in 1947, Gordon was drawn to acting and live theater, which he majored in at university. After graduation, he started his own theater company and engaged in highly provocative stagings. One of these, The Game Show, was designed as an attack on audience apathy. With plants in the audience, Gordon’s cast would begin to provoke the viewers, and each show would conclude with an audience riot that brought the play to a halt. He put on a politically charged adaptation of Peter Pan in 1968, which got him and his wife arrested for obscenity. Live nude actors and allusions to pixie dust being a substitution for LSD seemed to draw ire from the community. Gordon would come around to film in the mid-1980s, with his first production being The Re-Animator and From Beyond as his follow-up.

Podcast Mini-Series Preview: Love at First Laugh Episode 1 – His Girl Friday

Ariana and Seth kick off their six episode podcast mini-series exploring romantic comedies. This first episode sees them sharing their thoughts on the genre (what they love, what they loathe) and talking about the classic Howard Hawks comedy His Girl Friday starring Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant. All upcoming episodes will be available exclusively to our Patreon subscribers.

Movie Review – House

House (1977)
Written by Chigumi Obayashi and Chiho Katsura
Directed by Nobuhiko Obayashi

Following the phenomenal success of Jaws at the box office, Japanese film studio Toho went to Nobuhiko Obayashi and proposed he develop a similar script. Obayashi was an odd choice. His filmmaking career focused on personal, avant-garde experimental movies and TV ads, not big commercial hits. The director discussed the script with Chigumi, his preteen daughter, positing that telling everything from an adult perspective is limiting for films. From young Chigumi, he got several of the set pieces that would end up in House, including a mirror attacking the audience and a house eating a girl. The final product doesn’t have much in common with Jaws, but it is a film you won’t forget after watching it.