Favorite films

Recent reviews

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  The Kid with X-Ray Eyes 1999

  ★★ Watched 09 Jun 2023

  A typical 90s DTV kids' movie, this isn't terrible, but it also offers little reason to watch it beyond weird time capsule curiosity. Bobby, a twelve-year-old boy obsessed with spy stories, is sent to hang out with his surf bum uncle while his mom and his stepfather go on their honeymoon, and the two soon discover a pair of high-tech x-ray goggles that's been misplaced by the CIA when it washes up on the beach. This draws the attention of…

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  Slaughter Day 1991

  ★★★ Watched 08 Jun 2023

  The people who made this movie (a pair of brothers named Brent and Blake Cousins and their friends) had little more than a gas mask and a cheap camcorder to work with, but they still managed to produce a pretty entertaining hour-long splatterfest with it. The technology they were working with certainly holds back the filmmaking in certain regards (in particular, it leads to some fairly messy edits), and they probably could've bothered to come up with something in the…

Popular reviews

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  Lisa Frankenstein 2024

  ★★ Watched 05 Feb 2024

  This movie starts out with an intriguing premise, but it has a serious problem, which is that it doesn't seem certain of what it wants to be. Is it a tragic gothic teen romantic fantasy a la Edward Scissorhands? Or is it a mean-spirited misanthropic black comedy set in a high school a la Heathers? At times it appears to be going for the former (it definitely owes an exceedingly heavy aesthetic debt to Tim Burton, whose influence is all…

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  The Last Seduction 1994

  ★★★½ Watched 24 Feb 2025

  The Last Seduction is an excellent example of the power of a great performance to elevate what otherwise might be a decent but unexceptional movie, because without Linda Fiorentino that's all it would be. The plot is perfectly serviceable, but it really is just a mid-90s re-mix of Double Indemnity. The script is solid, but hardly overflowing with indelible lines or character moments. The filmmaking is competent but not dazzling. The other performances are all fine. There's nothing wrong with…