This week on The Movie Gourmet – new reviews of Dream Scenario and Desperate Souls, Dark City and the Legend of Midnight Cowboy. As I write, Desperate Souls, Dark City and the Legend of Midnight Cowboy is number 21 on my carefully curated list of Longest Movie Titles.
When we het to the Holidays I pause my regular WATCH AT HOME feature The most eclectic watch-at-home recommendations you’ll find ANYWHERE) and replace it with the movies from my Best of 2023 list that are already available to stream.
CURRENT MOVIES
- Anatomy of a Fall: family history, with life or death stakes. In theaters.
- Killers of the Flower Moon: an epic tale of epic betrayal. AppleTV (subscription), Amazon.
- The Holdovers: three souls must evolve beyond their losses. In theaters, Amazon.
- Dream Scenario: but it can’t be my fault, can it? In theaters.
- The Lady Bird Diaries: essential history. Hulu.
- Rustin: greatness, overlooked. Netflix.
- Napoleon: didn’t they name a complex after this guy? In theaters before it streams on Apple TV.
- The Pigeon Tunnel: a great storyteller’s story, told at last. AppleTV.
- Fremont: self-discovery and a fortune cookie. Amazon, Vudu.
- May December: a seat-squirmer of a psychodrama. Netflix.
- The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial: just what, not who, is on trial here? Showtime/Paramount+.
- Flora and Son: a bad mom turns it around. In theaters and AppleTV.
- The Disappearance of Shere Hite: revoking one’s own celebrity. In theaters.
- Cypher: the year’s most original movie? Hulu.
- Desperate Souls, Dark City and the Legend of Midnight Cowboy: a movie and its time. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu,YouTube.
- The Killer: interior monologue. Netflix.
- Our Father, The Devil: can revenge extinguish trauma? AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube, redbox.
- Reptile: a neo-noir showcase for Benicio del Toro. Netflix.
- Oppenheimer: creator of a monster controlled by others. Still in theaters.
- The Stones and Brian Jones: casualty of rock. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- Priscilla: icky, then unpleasant. In theaters.
WATCH AT HOME
From my Best Movies of 2023 – so far:
- OPPENHEIMER: creator of a monster controlled by others. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- PAST LIVES: a profound and refreshing romance. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON: an epic tale of epic betrayal. AppleTV (subscription), Amazon.
- THE MAN WHO DID NOT WANT TO SEE TITANIC: wow – laughs, thrills, love. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- RETURN TO SEOUL: brilliantly crafted and emotionally gripping. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- BARBIE: a marriage of the intelligent and the silly. Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
- FREMONT: self-discovery and a fortune cookie. Amazon, Vudu.
- HANNAH HA HA: what makes for human value and fulfillment? Amazon, AppleTV, Vudu, YouTube.
ON TV
On December 13, Turner Classic Movies will present an overlooked masterwork. Set in England just before the D-Day invasion, The Americanization of Emily (1964) is a biting satire and one of the great anti-war movies. James Garner plays an admiral’s staff officer charged with locating luxury goods and willing Englishwomen for the brass. Julie Andrews plays an English driver who has lost her husband and other male family members in the War. She resists emotional entanglements with other servicemen whose lives may be put at risk, but falls for Garner’s “practicing coward”, a man who is under no illusions about the glory of war and is determined to stay as far from combat as possible.
Unfortunately, Garner’s boss (Melvyn Douglas) has fits of derangement and becomes obsessed with the hope that the first American killed on the beach at D-Day be from the Navy. Accordingly, he orders Garner to lead a suicide mission to land ahead of the D-Day landing, ostensibly to film it. Fellow officer James Coburn must guarantee Garner’s martyrdom.
It’s a brilliant screenplay from Paddy Chayefsky, who won screenwriting Oscars for Marty, The Hospital and Network. Today, Americanization holds up as least as well as its contemporary Dr. Strangelove and much better than Failsafe. Reportedly, both Andrews and Garner have tagged this as their favorite film.
One of the “Three Nameless Broads” bedded by the Coburn character is played by Judy Carne, later of Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In.