Movies

Texas had summer thunderstorms last week but now the oppressive heat is back. I tried to write a little but could not get very far. The whole debacle over mask mandates in schools is exhausting. Republicans love "local control" until it comes to counties, cities, and school districts defying mask bans to keep children safe. Then it's "how dare you" and "I'll block your funding" and lawsuits. The FDA better approve the vaccines soon so younger kids can start getting vaccines! Meanwhile the hospitals are packed with Covid cases because "freedom loving" adults still won't get vaccinated. So depressing. The rest of us will have to start getting booster shots.

I saw a few movies lately, such as Jungle Cruise, Respect, and The Protégé. They were pretty good. Dev Patel was great in The Green Knight, though I remain puzzled by what Morgan Le Fay was trying to accomplish with all her spells. Making a big deal of trying to protect him with the green garter/belt, but also seeming to suggest that it's a cheat which only a dishonorable coward would use. The director also makes the movie's themes very vague and mysterious, with the ambiguous fox spirit and all the weird magical occurrences. Gawain has a haunting ghost encounter with St. Winifred, as she tells him about how she was murdered. She rebukes him when he seems to want a reward for helping her. That's not how a chivalrous knight ought to behave. Is the whole quest to teach him how to behave? But then not give him a chance to learn from his mistakes? Perplexing. This interview with the director gives some answers, but is full of spoilers, if you haven't seen it.

Anyway, Maggie Q was great in The Protégé, but I didn't realize the film would take place mostly in Vietnam. I also didn't like her weird romance with Michael Keaton's character Rembrandt. First of all, I hate the Hollywood trope of a younger woman with a much older man. Second, he wants to play it like he's not really a terrible guy. He claims he wasn't behind Moody's death, the attack on her bookstore, and that poor guy killed in the laundry steam press, but I'm certain he was still complicit in that evil stuff even if he didn't dirty his hands in those particular incidents. (I don't even know if the bookshop assistant and the cat survived.) And then the movie has some other rival bad guy want to kill Rembrandt out of jealousy, so he and Anna have a mutual enemy for a while. It's a little silly, especially when Rembrandt's rival calls him a "boy wonder" when he's clearly not a boy, and not younger than the rival. But I did like seeing flashbacks explaining more of how Moody adopted Anna and why she was so traumatized that she never wanted to return. I don't know if I can take watching the gruesome deaths again, though it was good to see Maggie in Nikita mode again.

Jungle Cruise was fun, like the Brendan Fraser Mummy, but I think the backstory and myth about the conquistadors' quest was over-complicated. I might go back and rewatch Respect again, though.