
curated cinema: a quarter of a century later, a movie that we can now see as a drama about climate-change
2000’s The Perfect Storm is on Paramount+ in the US, Prime in the UK (and other services, too).

2000’s The Perfect Storm is on Paramount+ in the US, Prime in the UK (and other services, too).

Hooray for Glen Powell’s star rising, but this absurdly coy movie — is it a sequel? a remake? — is a cowardly, reckless missed opportunity: it’s deeply baffling that it omits any hint of global warming.

Plus a teenage con artist, a skewering of late-night comedy, and more… (First published September 18th, 2022, on Substack and Patreon.)

Solid, old-school man-versus-nature adventure melodrama, with a simmering green awareness; rollicking, smart, breathtaking, and sobering.

Hmm. Is there something in the zeitgeist that’s prompting movies about desolation and survival in harsh conditions?
It’s movies like this one that make me despair. Because it is going to make a bazillion bucks at the box office around the world, and there’s absolute nothing here that warrants such success.
Who knew there was so much on a cruise ship that could explode so spectacularly? Plus: ohmigod, Josh Lucas!

An intense and terrifying man-against-nature action movie, and also an unsentimental and unclichéd drama about following your bliss: doing what you’re made to do even to the point of risking your life.