Comiskey Park: An Unobstructed View

 

LAST COMISKEY (B+) - An unabashed labor of love, this DIY documentary pays tribute to the final season of Comiskey Park, home of the Chicago White Sox, before it faced the wrecking ball after the 1990 season. Matt Flesch conducts interviews with former players and curates fascinating footage from the Dick Allen/Bill Veeck/Harry Caray 1970s, an era of rowdy fun, if not pennants.

The talking heads include Ozzie Guillen (the star of the 1990 team, who would go on to bring that elusive championship to Chicago as manager in 2005); journeymen pitchers like Donn Paul, Scott Radisnky, Greg Hibbard, Bobby Thigpen and Jack McDowell (who all pay tribute to veteran catcher Carlton Fisk); and scrappy players Scott Fletcher and Lance Johnson. A key figure is organist Nancy Faust, the team's scrappy little sister who invented the walk-up song in the '70s ("Jesus Christ Superstar" for Dick Allen, etal.) and popularized a little pop song called "Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye," an all-purpose ditty to accompany home runs (with the exploding scoreboard) as well as disgraced pitchers going through the walk of shame back to the dugout.

The charm here emanates from the Everyman production, which lovingly slaps together home movies and video clips going back to the days of lonely WSNS-Channel 44. My brother, a teen back then, broke from the family's generations of hapless Cubs fans to adopt the South Side Hitmen as is favorite team, and he was old enough in '77 to lead excursions to the left-field bleachers and occasionally take me along, though I don't remember if I was allowed to sip from the fat thermos of lemonade (spiked with gin to create the exotic Jungle Juice). It was from there that we beckoned rocket salvos from the free-agents-to-be Oscar Gamble and Richie Zisk, whom Veeck had rented for the season, and fellow thumper Eric Soderholm. This documentary is smart enough to include shots from below the bleachers, the field-level picnic area behind the left-fielder. (And don't forget the discounted seats behind the huge poles in the grandstand; you'd have to lean left or right to follow the action.)

That was quite the season at 35th and Shields. Both the Cubs and Sox would taste first place in late June and early July before the inevitable collapse, and the working-class giddiness was infectious at Comiskey park all summer. This documentary cherishes that history but always returns its focus to 1990, as the clock ticks toward the last out at the revered ballpark that once hosted Babe Ruth and other legends at the first All-Star Game in 1933. Showdowns with the mighty Oakland A's (the former champs were bloated by steroid use, especially Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire) build drama toward a hard-fought pennant chase. It was the kind of year when the Sox beat the Yankees 4-0 despite being no-hit by Andy Hawkins.

No one is too incidental to the story. We hear not just from the former GM and the players, but also from Faust, beer vendors, diehard fans. It's fun to hear slugger Ron Kittle reminisce about the cook and clubhouse guy "Chicken" Willie Thompson. Kenny McReynolds, a basketball veteran turned broadcaster, grew up in the shadow of Comiskey in a public-housing complex and has great memories to share. We're reminded of Frank Thomas' Major League debut mid-season.

It certainly helps if you are a Sox fan or a Chicagoan, but just about any sports fan could appreciate this video fanzine. Director Flesch gets an assist from veteran sportscaster Tom Shaer, which must have helped with the narrative flow, which builds to a truly moving conclusion. If this movie happened by accident, it was a happy one.

BONUS BABY

REGGIE (B+) - With a free month of Amazon Prime we caught up with this admiring documentary about another '70s favorite, Reggie Jackson, who made us a Yankees fan back in the day. Jackson is remarkably self-reflective about his role in baseball and pop culture history. He pals around with his sports-celebrity pals, like Julius "Dr. J" Erving and his longtime Oakland A's pals Rollie Fingers and Joe Rudi. 

The documentary by Alex Stapleton works methodically through Jackson's timeline, from growing up in the segregated South through his incredible exploits with the A's and Yankees. The theme of racial struggle is woven throughout the 105-minute film. Particularly moving is a story Jackson tells about being humiliated at age 12 by the father of a white friend who had lent him a bicycle; Stapleton places the story within the context of Jackson's battles with Yankee manager Billy Martin during Jackson's inaugural 1977 season in New York, fresh from signing a $3 million five-year contract. 

It is all worth it to a slow build toward the two-thirds mark, when we once again get to experience Jackson's epic performance in Game 6 against the Dodgers that year, when he hit three home runs on three consecutive swings, a power show for the ages. No wonder he had a candy bar named after him.

Jackson is wistful throughout this documentary, considerate not just about himself, but the game of baseball itself. This would come off as fawning if Jackson didn't seem so genuine as an elder statesman.

BONUS TRACKS

Here is Part 1 of "Last Comiskey":

"Na-na na na ......"

The Double Life of ...

 

BLUE JEAN (B+) - Newcomer Rose McEwen digs deep for a moving performance as a closeted gym teacher in Maggie Thatcher's England during the reactionary crackdown on gay rights in the late 1980s. She plays Jean Newman, a cute, conflicted woman struggling to balance her work life and private life, unsure how to handle the consequences of living an authentic life.

 

She lives in a cramped apartment (where she mopes in front of the blandly hetero program "Blind Date" on the telly) and enjoys nights at the pub with her butch, out girlfriend Viv (Kerrie Hayes) and their circle of incestuous gal-pals. Things get complicated when a new student, Lois (Lucy Halliday), pops up at the same gay bar, and Jean feels her worlds colliding. At school, Lois is bullied by her straight classmates, led by alpha girl Siobhan (Lydia Page), and Jean feels helpless to stop it.

This is a debut feature from writer-director Georgia Oakley, who avoids cliches and takes time to flesh out these key characters. Jean reads as straight, so she "passes" well in social situations and with the other teachers and coaches (though she refuses to hit the pub with them after school). Oakley builds tension slowly and assuredly, and Jean's inner turmoil thrums to an anti-climax. That ending feels a little too pat and simplistic, but it doesn't undo the moving character study of an era that still feels haunting.

MADELEINE COLLINS (B-minus) - There may be times that you make it to the end of a challenging movie, and you managed to figure everything out finally, but if you had been in charge you would have put it together differently. This story of a woman impossibly juggling two separate families (in Paris and Geneva) is too often a chore to parse, top-heavy with mundane world-building and a rushed over-emotional ending.

Virginie Efira is Judith, a striving professional (she is a translator who often works remotely), married to a orchestra conductor and with two teen boys who seem to spend a lot of time at boarding school. Judith has concocted an elaborate ruse of weekly work trips but instead takes the train to Abdel (Quim Gutierrez) and their preschool daughter Ninon (a haunting Loise Benguerel), in a tense, fragile household in Switzerland. At first, Judith seems adept at alternating between these two existences. But her subterfuge slowly unravels.

Director Antoine Barraud (from a script he wrote with Helena Klotz) opens with a bit of mystery and misdirection. A woman shopping for a dress has a fainting spell and then an apparently fatal accident. Her connection to Judith is not entirely clear, though some might be quicker than I was to notice the parallels unfold and piece this together well before the halfway mark. If you don't do that, you might be frustrated by the leisurely pace of Barraud in connecting the dots and unmasking Judith's untenable ploy.

Efira is occasionally arresting but too often bland (in a Kim Cattrall way) as a woman who wants to have her cake and eat it too, all while testing the patience of a boss frustrated by her growing unreliability. The film barely earns the right to then race to a climax that eventually reveals Judith's full motivations and her sociopathic weaknesses. Judith seems to have more of an emotional connection with the shady character who supplies her with fake IDs than she does with her two partners; that's an interesting idea that is underdeveloped but well played in the final scene. I wish there was a better way to put this whole puzzle together. (With Jacqueline Bisset as Judith's judgmental mother.)

BONUS TRACK

At a house party, a cathartic punk dance moment features "Maggie, Maggie, Maggie, Out, Out, Out" by the Larks:

Soundtrack of Your (So-Called) Life

  Soundtrack of Your Life is an occasional feature in which we mark the songs of our relative youth as played over public muzak systems.

That Hulu binge we were on allowed for some TV viewing. We revisited "My So-Called Life" from 1994-95, and I was reminded of how charmed I was back in the day not only by the interactions of the three engaging teens but also by the parents, whose age I was closer to at the time. Claire Danes as, like, the beta emo chick; the endlessly appealing A.J. Langer as the art-punk Rayanne; Wilson Cruz as shy gay Rickie; and, of course, Jared Leto as Jordan Catalano! I picked up on Winnie Holzman's call-backs to "Square Pegs," another short-lived gem from more than a decade earlier. 

It's the soundtrack that helps sell the show. The first episode crescendoed with the now-cliche "Everybody Hurts" from R.E.M., and the 19-show playlist includes such early '90s darlings as Juliana Hatfield, the Cranberries, Afghan Whigs, Archers of Loaf, and even a nugget from Daniel Johnston (at least on the soundtrack).

The show premiered in late 1994, coasting on the gasoline fumes of the Heyday of the Planet of Sound, which had ended just months earlier with the death of Kurt Cobain (whose R.I.P. Rolling Stone cover is glimpsed during the Halloween episode). In my car I've been listening to an Apple Music algorithm that has spun off from that era's Wedding Present and Wonderstuff into some deep cuts (James' "Sit Down," for example). I'm reminded that nothing has quite sounded like Inspiral Carpets, either before or after their run three decades ago. 

I could go on about "My So-Called Life," but the song that inspired this post appeared in episode 11, spinning, improbably, at the high school dance. It was from those faux hipster-doofuses from the Chicago scene, Urge Overkill. That same year they would break big on the "Pulp Fiction" soundtrack with a Neil Diamond cover (that was originally on their "Stull" EP). When I heard the song last night I needed to Shazam it in order to identify the familiar beat.

Date: November 21, 2023, 7:20 p.m.

Place: Home

Song:  "Dropout"

Artist: Urge Overkill

Irony Matrix: 1.5 out of 10

Comment: With the album "Saturation," Urge Overkill went national with ironic power-rock songs like "Sister Havana," "Erica Kane" and "Bottle of Fur." "Dropout" is dripping with angst. "You're too old to cry," they deadpan, "you're too young to die." They name-check Dairy Queen. It fades out with a pleasant shuffle after nearly five minutes. The boys took a lot of crap as poseurs and obnoxious scenesters. They had indie cred on Touch and Go Records, working with star producer/engineers Butch Vig and Steve Albini. With "Saturation" they sold out to Geffen Records, and they would quickly flame out in '95, doomed to the cut-out bins. For a while they held their own with Chicago rivals Smashing Pumpkins, Liz Phair and Veruca Salt. It was a moment. 

Albini would infamously turn on Urge Overkill and the others, in a blistering letter to the weekly Chicago Reader titled "Three Pandering Sluts and Their Music-Press Stooge," a literal "fuck you" to rock critic Bill Wyman. Castigating the bands as major-label whores, he refers to UO as "Weiners in suits playing frat party rock, trying to tap a goofy trend that doesn’t even exist." The whole letter is worth a read. (The vivid language still resonates, from "you wave your boob flag proudly" to "you don't know shit from fat meat.") I still laugh at his comparison of Phair to Rickie Lee Jones ("a fucking chore to listen to"). Like I said, it was a moment, and we tended to get a little het up about such things. 

I found something to appreciate about Urge Overkill, Smashing Pumpkins ("Siamese Dream" still mostly holds up) and even Phair, who, bless her heart, couldn't sing (every generation gets the Stevie Nicks it deserves), but "Girls! Girls! Girls!" is a great single. Urge Overkill might have, as Albini predicted, blown their promo wads and sunk into obscurity, but their early stuff had some heft to it. We'll always have Guyville.

BONUS TRACK

Episode 12 of "My So-Called Life" promises a live performance by the era's ultimate power trio Buffalo Tom. Let's spin one of our all-time favorites (and my dog Remy's, too, at the time), "Velvet Roof":

Amour Fou

 We reach the bottom of our Hulu queue just in time to cancel. Here are two French films.

TWO OF US (2019) (B+) - The only film by Filippo Meneghetti is a clear-headed ode to true love, the story of two late-in-life lesbians who are constrained by the fear of one of them to come out to her family. And when a health crisis hits, the other is helpless to step in.

This sounds like a classic TV movie-of-the-week -- except for the same-sex part -- but it is richer and deeper than that, a profound slice of life that explores the inner worlds of Nina (Barbara Sukowa) and Madeleine (Martine Chevallier), who live across the hall from each other in a nondescript apartment building. Madeleine's daughter, Anne, and family don't know that the two are lovers, having fallen in love ages ago when they met in Rome. When alone, they are a tender couple, cozy in each other's company; when dour Anne (Lea Drucker) and others are around, they appear to be cordial neighbors.

Then Madeleine suffers a stroke. Nina's instinct is to nurse her partner back to health. But Madeleine, who survived an abusive relationship with a husband, never had the talk with Anne, and so Anne treats Nina like a snoop. And Nina acts like one, using her key to creep into Madeleine's apartment, spooking the live-in nurse (Muriel Benazeraf). Nina is desperate, feeling robbed of the ultimate duty of an aging spouse.

Anne soon starts picking up the hints that have been obvious all along. Meneghetti (writing the script with Malysone Bovorasmy and Florence Vignon ("Mademoiselle Chambon")) crafts this like a claustrophobic thriller. The two leads are powerful, especially Chevallier who communicates volumes with her eyes while incapacitated. Sukowa, known for her biographical portrayals of Hannah Arendt and Rosa Luxemburg, is ferocious. Meneghetti paces the narrative like a pro, keeping you guessing as to whether this will end in tragedy or if true love will win out in the end.

ANAIS IN LOVE (B-minus) - I don't watch Lifetime movies, but from what I've heard, this movie might have a lot in common with them. Do they have harried heroines who run around a lot because they're late? Do the women make ditzy decisions about whom to fall in love with? Is their mom usually dying of cancer? Do they learn a deep life lesson from their 90-minute experience?

This French farce -- with a few dollops of gravitas -- checks all the right boxes to qualify as a run-of-the-mill rom-com, albeit with a French twist. Anais (Anais Demoustier) is 30 going on 16; her hyperactive nature drives away a live-in boyfriend, and when she hooks up with a married professor, she comes off as a stalker or striver rather than any sort of young muse. That bears out, eventually, when the shlubby professor turns out to have a riveting wife, noted author Emilie (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi from "5x2"), whom Anais exalts as a paragon of intelligence and beauty.

It is tough to buy into the relationship between Anais and Daniel the professor (Denis Podalydes), and thus everything after their meeting feels like a cheap plot device. The whimsical nature of the narrative always feels too breezy for any emotions to really land. This is a debut film from Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet, and she occasionally shows a flair for a clever line or a dramatic swerve, but she never captures a believable tone. Demoustier is charming but lightweight. It feels like Tedeschi is slumming, the power of her talent wasted in a "New Girl" knockoff.

BONUS TRACK

"Two of Us" makes lovely use of Petula Clark's "Chariot (Sul Mio Carro)," the Italian forerunner of the 1963 hit "I Will Follow Him." (She also recorded a French version.) For Nina and Madeleine, it is their song, marking the love affair that began in Rome. 

New to the Queue

 Expanding the possibilities ...

We might have the bandwidth for a documentary about a hospital grief counselor during the pandemic, despite the missing comma in the title (?), "A Still Small Voice."

We're curious about a movie in which Nicolas Cage stars as an Everyman who starts appearing in everyone's dreams, "Dream Scenario."

We're wary that it might be too twee, but we might take time for the audacious, poetic debut film, "All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt."

A documentary profile of the provocative sex researcher, "The Disappearance of Shere Hite."

Nick Broomfield ("Kurt & Courtney," "Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love") takes his X-acto knife to the troubled '60s blues rocker in "The Stones and Brian Jones."

A deadpan rom-com, from director Akis Kaurismaki ("The Match Factory Girl"), who has flown below our radar, "Fallen Leaves."

Doc Watch: Comedy Gold

 

ALBERT BROOKS: DEFENDING MY LIFE (B) - This is a friendly, by-the-numbers chronological march through the life of the funniest man of my lifetime. Albert Brooks sits down for coffee and poundcake with his childhood pal, Rob Reiner, as they kibbitz and introduce classic clips from Brooks' career.

 Brooks was a legend of absurdist standup routines going back to the '60s, a heavy influence on the likes of David Letterman and Judd Apatow, who appear here along with a bevy of admirers, including Chris Rock, Sarah Silverman, Nikki Glaser and Conan O'Brien. (Odd choices include fangirl Alana Haim and disgraced newsman Brian Williams.) 

Reiner and Brooks are fun to watch together, including in a clip of Reiner hosting the "Tonight Show" with Brooks and Penny Marshall as guests. All the touchstones are here -- the "Comedy Minus One" album, the foundational "Real Life" mockumentary, the beloved "Modern Romance," the ground-zero "Lost in America" and his star-making turn in "Broadcast News." (He has only eight directing credits in his career.)

The documentary, streaming on HBO's Max, spends a little too much of its 92 minutes on Brooks' show-biz parents. His dad Harry Einstein was a comedian's comedian known for his ethnic character Parkyakarkus and for dropping dead onstage immediately after slaying the crowd at the Friars' Club in the late 1950s. His mother was a singer and actress who gave up her career to raise their boys, though not without a dollop of bitterness.

If you're not a fan, little of this will register. If you are a fan, you might feel cheated by the chopping up of his best bits, such as the fumbling ventriloquist routine. Brooks trafficked in high-concept material, and 30 seconds of the Speak-n-Spell routine in front of Johnny Carson simply doesn't do justice to one of the funniest one-offs in the history of comedy. But a seat at the table with Brooks and Reiner is often a delight. Brooks' closing statement before the credits -- about why he never took the easy road -- offers a rather profound encapsulation of a great comic's career.

THE IMPROV: 60 AND STILL STANDING (B-minus) - This is not so much a film as a standup special extended to feature length, featuring the cream of the cop among the comics who have graced The Improv in Los Angeles for six decades. Your mileage will vary with each comic, ranging from the icy observations of Deon Cole from "Blackish" to -- yes, I'm actually typing this -- ventriloquist Jeff Dunham and that curmudgeonly old dummy of his.

We get about 10 new sets (though some of the comics do call-backs to their early years at the Improv) over 80 minutes, with interstitial classic clips from back in the heyday, featuring the likes of Jerry Seinfeld, Wanda Sykes, Ray Romano, and impossibly young versions of Sarah Silverman and Adam Sandler. Those archival videos are astoundingly hit and miss considering they are to have been deemed the cream of the crop. Silverman and Sandler are great, but Seinfeld's brief excerpt is not among his best. Neither are Dave Attell and Margaret Cho. And if David Spade was ever funny, his baby-faced routine here is not evidence of it.

But, back to the present day, Whitney Cummings brings the heat. And Kevin Nealon is surprisingly sharp (until he descends into his hoary signature routine). Craig Robinson is on his own planet with an alluringly vulgar turn at the piano. Some of the younger comics have their moments, but none of them are very memorable.

It might have been fun to explore the venue's history a little more. A night of chopped-up comedy bits and some scattered greatest hits makes for a passable evening.

Group Therapy

 The Hulu binge continues ...

ALL MY FRIENDS HATE ME (2021) (A-minus) - This is an utterly British cringe comedy, powered by its star (and co-writer), Tom Stourton, about a reunion of college friends that turns into a nightmare for our awkward hero. 

Stourton is amiable Pete, who is totally unprepared for the apparent gaslighting he will experience all weekend at a country estate with his former best friends, including an ex-girlfriend. There is an interloper, a local named Harry (a naughty Dustin Demri-Burns), who mocks Pete, invades his personal space, and likes to take notes whenever Pete makes a social faux pas. 

With a dash of Monty Python absurdism, the film locks Pete into a spiral of anxiety he just can't escape, thanks to the outrageous antics of his mates, who seem to resent him for dumping Claire (Antonia Clarke) and for being a goody-two-shoes aid worker. When his future fiancee arrives, there is a fear that she is joining the plot against him. Pete is a nice guy trapped in a no-win situation, a bit like a millennial Dick Van Dyke navigating a sitcom nightmare. 

The dialogue zips around among the characters, and the tension ratchets at just the right pace. Stourton commands every scene with an Everyman charm, and the ensemble keeps him on his toes. A climactic reckoning is both bizarre and a bit chilling -- a dash of David Lynch to seal the deal. A wry coda puts a neat bow on this little gem.

MARK, MARY + SOME OTHER PEOPLE (2021) (A-minus) - Hannah Marks ("Banana Split") writes and directs, and assembles a fantastic cast of millennials for a funny and insightful think piece about open relationships. She is blessed with two strong leads as the quirky couple, Mark and Mary, played with verve and nuance by shlubby Ben Rosenfield and the dynamic Hayley Law. 

Rosenfield's Mark is perfectly awkward but also situationally confident. He rocks a pathetic porn 'stache and wild hair. Law has a mesmerizing presence, with striking features and big, beautiful eyes. And she can sing. Mary fronts a punk band with her sister and a friend, Lana (an equally exotic Odessa A'zion), the latter of whom will find her way into a threesome with Mark and Mary after the couple opens up their marriage.

Mark and Mary start out with a meet-cute in a convenience store (having previously run into each other socially) and wed a year later. Mary comes up with the idea of non-monogamy but will soon feel some twinges of regret when Mark dives into the dating scene with verve. Never does their story descend into cliche or cheap gags; at all times this feels like a real couple exploring the future together and apart. 

The story has a heart and an edge to it. The script is meticulously written. Rosenfeld and Law live deeply in their characters, with a fair amount of workshopped improv apparent. It's constantly clever in a believable way. A laugh is always around the corner, but the emotional stakes are genuine.

The supporting cast bolsters the two leads. Mark, too, has a two-member Greek chorus to bounce things off of, and Nik Dodani and Matt Shively make the most of it, particularly when they are breaking down the dating scene or recoiling at the notion of parenthood. A couple of elders helps out as well -- Lea Thompson is cool as an OG poly, Aunty Carol, and Gillian Jacobs makes it look effortless as a wise-cracking gynecologist.

Marks has an ear for the patter of her generation, and she knows how to shape a narrative arc. Whether in front of the camera or behind it, she makes movies special.

BONUS TRACKS

The trailers:

 

Over the "Mark, Mary" closing credits, Cults with "Always Forever" ...

 ... and Green Day with "Holy Toldedo!":

Life Is Short: The C Team

 

We spent 2 months with Hulu (one month free) in order to catch up on some titles that we've been curious about but haven't seen streaming elsewhere. Some turned out well. Others not so much.

Here are three that didn't pan out, so we pulled the plug.

Title: DINNER IN AMERICA

Running Time: 106 MIN

Elapsed Time at Plug Pull:  5 MIN

Portion Watched: 5%

My Age at Time of Viewing: 60 YRS, 10 MOS.

Average Male American Lifespan: 78.8 YRS.

Watched/Did Instead: Watched the latest episode of "Last Week Tonight" on HBO.

Odds of Re-viewing This Title: 77-1

Comment: It was obvious right away that this is B-movie trash. The only question was whether sticking around for Hannah Marks ("Banana Split," "After Everything," "Mark, Mary + Some Other People"). It wasn't. This starts with a seedy leading man (Kyle Gallner), a punk rocker who will go on the lam with a fan. One of the first scenes features Gallner's character meeting the family of Marks' character, and would you believe the mom openly lusts after him across the dinner table? This one was going nowhere fast. It looked cheap and vulgar.

 

Title: MATERNA

Running Time: 105 MIN

Elapsed Time at Plug Pull:  41 MIN

Portion Watched: 39%

My Age at Time of Viewing: 60 YRS, 10 MOS.

Average Male American Lifespan: 78.8 YRS.

Watched/Did Instead: Watched an episode of the original British version of "The Office" on Hulu.

Odds of Re-viewing This Title: 13-1

Comment: This is a psychological study of four women revolving around their roles as (potential) mothers and their relationship with their own moms. We made it part-way through the second vignette, and the two lead women in those first two quarters were compelling at times to watch. Writer-director David Gutnik studies their faces intensely through frequent close-ups. We're a fan of Kate Lyn Shiel and never tire of her unique beauty. But her character's story was dishwater dull. Gutnik gives us long takes of her working on a virtual-reality project, interspersed with her routine daily habits (we get to see her water a plant and brush her teeth three different times each), all of which leads up to her discovering she is pregnant, performing a self-ultrasound (OK), and then conducting a medical abortion on herself. All the while, her mother nags her over the phone, worried that our heroine will turn into an old maid. The second vignette featured an actress, and that is one of our pet peeves -- actors playing actors, as if it's a back-breaking job. Jade Eshete is also fascinating to watch, mainly because of her perfect facial structure. But the tedium continued to build, and we started to squirm. Whatever Gutnik was trying to get across was lost in the monotony and lack of plot.

 

 

Title: SOMETHING IN THE DIRT

Running Time: 116 MIN

Elapsed Time at Plug Pull:  21MIN

Portion Watched: 18%

My Age at Time of Viewing: 60 YRS, 10 MOS.

Average Male American Lifespan: 78.8 YRS.

Watched/Did Instead: Sampled "Dinner in America" before turning to the latest episode of "Last Week Tonight" on HBO.

Odds of Re-viewing This Title: 22-1

Comment: Here was another psychological thriller that was more annoying than intriguing. We enjoyed the last outing from writer-director Justin Benson, the mind-bending cult psych-out "The Endless." And Benson and collaborator Aaron Moorhead again star in this new film. Maybe we're getting old (see data above), but the first reel of this film is all over the place, and the characters were off-putting. It was too cryptic for its own good. Two tenants of an apartment complex have a meet-cute and then weird supernatural evetnts, like flashing lights, keep happening. It looked like it was going nowhere fast and that it was going to be a chore to keep up over two hours. This looked promising, but we delivered a quick hook to this sophomore effort.