Just seeing that banner pic of Homer and Lisa made me emotional, so I guess that's the one for me. They have absolutely nothing in common and they both have to work to love each other. But they're both willing to and that's what makes it beautiful.

"You are my son. End of story."

Priscilla Presley was the secret MVP of the Naked Gun movies. She made Frank Drebin believably desirable.

Hey, look! It's someone's attractive cousin!

We've already seen Keanu as a serious lawyer man:

I remember Medicine for Melancholy as being well-meaning but forgettable. Like much of the mumblecore era of American indie film.

It's basically a big budget remake of Max Max 2: The Road Warrior. And its epic/cartoony world building isn't much you haven't seen in Waterworld or Tank Girl (inferior as they are).

Fury Road's world building was fantastic and Miller didn't feel the need to overexplain, but it's not much I haven't seen before. Even Tank Girl (yes, that movie) has a lot of great and similar world-building.

Stranger Things is a really fun pastiche of 80s films

I actually liked Fury Road a lot. But it's just a fun surface action film and it's very derivative as well (which people forget). It was overrated beyond belief because it was an underhyped installment in a franchise the vast majority of people don't even like. I doubt even seasoned critics have seen the earlier…

The same people complaining about The Force Awakens being a "copy" are the ones praising the equally (and less creatively) derivative Mad Max: Fury Road and the sloppy nostalgia fest that is Stranger Things. And both are emotionally hollow as hell…all surface.

Great stuff! I wouldn't mind a weekly feature on the "radio play of the week."

That's false memory. We say that we notice the major themes "immediately" in retrospect and/or because we grew up with with them. But in truth, you're lost in the moment when you watch it for the first time. There are actual theater recordings of people in 1977 watching Star Wars and they're not going "Wow!" the music…

1) Not really. It's just that those movies were so awful, the non-awful stuff really stands out and gets exaggerated. Ewan McGregor's "great" performance being another example of that.

Temp scores have been around forever, though. It really comes down to the director and studio execs not trusting their composer when a billion-dollar gross and an iron-clad release date is on the line. In that case, they'll opt for a generic Zimmer BWOMP or generic 3-note "melody" with generic orchestration.

Easily.

Two seasonal faves:
- Wendy's Bacon Mushroom Melt
- The McRib

On one hand, joining something as silly and self-congratulatory as the Academy would be lame. On the other hand, missing out on an opportunity to draw attention to (or away from) certain films would be a shame.

“sexy contemporary take” on Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist

Especially that Kanye Swift!