In 1990, a video was released called Playground, about Michael Jordan. Here’s the description of it: “This made-for-video production mixes highlights of Michael Jordan from the ’80s with a fantasy storyline of a high school teen named Walt, who has been cut from his basketball team. Doubting his abilities, Walt gets some lessons from Michael Jordan himself, on the magical Playground known as Michael Jordan’s Playground.” If you’re wondering why I’m doing a header on it, there’s an amazing reason why: this is Zack Snyder’s directorial debut!!! Yes, one of the biggest (and divisive) directors at the moment got his … Continue reading Scott OT #161: The Night Thread of Michael Jordan’s Playground (1/7)

It’s the end of the month (and the year, but that list is coming tomorrow), so here’s the best movies I saw for the first time in December. 10.) Minding the Gap directed by Bing Liu, 2018 9.) Creed II directed by Steven Caple Jr., 2018 8.) Searching directed by Aneesh Chaganty, 2018 7.) The Ballad of Buster Scruggs directed by Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, 2018 6.) The Favourite directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, 2018 5.) Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman, 2018 4.) Roma directed by Alfonso Cuaron, 2018 3.) The Reckless Moment directed … Continue reading Scott OT #158: The Last Night Thread of 2018 (12/31)

It’s Christmas time, so it’s time for a storied tradition: posting a gif of that time a drunken Kiefer Sutherland attacked a Christmas tree. Hope you all have fun posting here tonight and have a great Christmas! (And don’t tackle tree.) Also, my gift haul: some new pants for work, some candy, Super Mario Odyssey, Donkey Kong: Tropical Freeze, Mega Man 11, some neat Egyptian stuff from TTIP, and a cool scratch-off movie poster featuring a bunch of movies to see. Continue reading Scott OT #156: Christmas Night Thread (12/25)

It’s the end of the month, so it’s time for the best movies I saw in November. 10.) Suspiria directed by Luca Guadagnino, 2018 9.) Sorry to Bother You directed by Boots Riley, 2018 8.) First Man directed by Damian Chazelle, 2018 7.) Widows directed by Steve McQueen, 2018 6.) The Devil Rides Out directed by Terence Fisher, 1968 5.) Toni directed Jean Renoir, 1935 4.) The Housemaid directed by Kim Ki-young, 1960 3.) Shame directed by Ingmar Bergman, 1968 2.) A Page of Madness directed by Teinosuke Kinugasa, 1926 1.) Dragon Inn directed by King Hu, 1967 Runner-ups: Electric Boogaloo: … Continue reading Scott OT #150: The Last Night Thread of November (11/30)

Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe character has appeared in many great movies, from Howard Hawks’ The Big Sleep (ignore the Michael Winner version) to Lady in the Lake. The two I’ll be looking at tonight are The Long Goodbye and Farewell, My Lovely. They’re both from the ’70s, they’re both very good (though Long Goodbye is much, much better), and, inexplicably, they both star ’80s action stars in bit parts. The Long Goodbye features a very young Arnold Schwarzenegger, 11 years before The Terminator… And Farewell, My Lovely features a young Sylvester Stallone, a year before Rocky… Hope you all have … Continue reading Scott OT #149: The Night Thread of ’80s Action Stars Appearing in ’70s Philip Marlowe Movies (11/28)

The entertainment world collectively mourned the death of Stan Lee yesterday. He had… a very complicated legacy: he was not very good at sharing credit to say the least. Still, the entertainment world would look very, very, very, very, very different today without him and he will be missed. Since his entire story is too damn big for a simple OT header, I’m not even going to try so here’s his cameo in Mallrats. Hope you all have fun posting here tonight and have a great night. Continue reading Scott OT #147: The Night Thread Remembers a Legend (11/13)

This header was originally going to be a review of the new Grinch movie based on the bits and pieces I’ve seen of it while running food. However, it wound up being so dumb, even I couldn’t publish it! So, here’s some Beavis and Sally to replace it! Hope you all have fun posting here tonight and have a great night. (Also, my FilmStruck binge is coming to an end soon. I still have many movies to watch on there but I’ve gotten most of the ones that I really, really want to see out of the way.) Continue reading Scott OT #146: The Night Thread Phones it In (11/11)

I’m busy in the throes of my FilmStruck binge (which is why I’ve mostly been AWOL the past few days), so I thought it be good to recommend the three very best movies I’ve watched in said binge: Dragon Inn, an amazing martial arts movie from King Hu. A Page of Madness, a wonderfully creepy horror movie from Teinosuke Kinugasa. Shame, an utterly haunting movie from Ingmar Bergman with great performances from Liv Ullmann and Max von Sydow. Hope you all have fun posting here tonight and have a great night. Continue reading Scott OT #145: The Night Thread Recommends Some Movies (11/8)