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I knew I was damning myself to the black abyss of comedy when I clicked the Netflix thumbnail. I have seen many, many bad movies. In fact, I was heavily involved in the Leslie Nielson hurl fest 2001: A Space Travesty, in the top 10 of the worst movies ever made. It dropped a notch after this putrid salad of imbecilic cranial farting. I'm even credited as a writer. Ouch. But, no. THIS is the worst movie ever made, and I've sat through some epic excrement. I could barely watch 10 minutes. As for 2001, I tried. I really tried to influence the director and producers to get the bar up as close as possible to Airplane and Naked Gun. I'm a huge fan along with Monty Python. It was a dream opportunity and it failed in ways my brain still can't come to terms with. Many of my gags were used, but they died excruciating deaths at the hands of the ex-shoe salesmen and ambulance-chasing lawyers pretending to be filmmakers. The saving grace was the end titles which I was responsible for. Pretty well the funniest thing about the movie. They're up on YouTube if you care to watch.

This is not France of the 60s with its New Wave. We've moved beyond that cinematically. This is a director with no idea what she's doing and foisting it on us. Boredom for 2 hours. If you gave it a high rating, you're in denial or just a delusional poser pretending to be a critic.

Although not for people with short attention spans (most people, that is), this series is the existential narrative of our times. Being a certain age where there's less time ahead of me than behind, it made my understanding of my purpose on Earth deeper and clearer. It even made me less afraid of dying. You'll understand in the last episode when the mystery of the universe is explained in a simple and wonderful way. It confirmed my understanding of God as I envisioned him.

Great storytelling, dialogue and sublime acting make this an experience that anyone with questions about life will find answers to. I was reading Stephen King before most people knew him. I lost faith in him recently. That has been renewed through Mike Flanagan.

Ignore the 1/10 reviews. Seems there's a concerted effort, perhaps by a certain demographic, to denigrate this film. It's exceptional on all levels. Gripping, brutally realistic, and heart wrenching. The cast is superb. Now on Netflix. MUST WATCH.

I don't get why anyone would want to watch a POV movie. This is, by far, the best (worst) example of why you shouldn't do it. The director belongs in jail. Blair Witch Project was a one-off. A freak of nature and something I couldn't stomach. Basically, Grace is a few million dollars wasted. I couldn't even find it on Box Office Mojo. All I felt was frustration for about 99 % of it. POV should only be used for effect in a scene here in there. And sparingly. Like a bad acid trip, for example. You cast a beautiful actress and only show her once in a while in a mirror? Come on! That camera should have been all over her. Respect your demographic (14 yo boys) and exploit that girl to the max. Any decent producer would have insisted on it. I won't even mention the lame, tired script and clumsy mise-en-scene. The priest nonsense at the end was unbearable. Ignore the positive reviews here. A typically bad Canadian movie where personality and smooth talkers get government funding and not ability or talent. Watch only if you really need a reason to take a step off that ledge.

How did this film slip through my watch list? I just saw it yesterday.

Imagine yourself as a five year old child never having seen the outside world. What would it be like growing up in a single room of about 10 X 10 feet with your mother as your only companion?

That room is where about half this movie takes place. Jack was born there after his mother became pregnant from her abusive kidnapper. You would think that the confined space would induce claustrophobia. It does, but that's only one of the visceral emotions you'll experience watching this remarkable film.

Seven years into her captivity, their story comes to painful life as we discover how she lovingly nurtures Jack, the precocious boy with the heart of a poet. The jeopardy is palatable. Excruciating. And it carries us through to the inevitable escape with enough nail-biting to match the scariest thriller.

Although most of "Room" takes place in a tiny space, Jack's perception and description of it turns it into a magical universe that is rich, colourful and exciting. You are propelled by the child's imagination through an intense experience that will leave you breathless.

The screenplay is astonishing. It's what dreams are made of for a writer like myself. The childish words coming from Jack, whether interacting with Ma or in voice-over narration, are, as I said, poetry. The only way to experience it is by listening to it. A young Jacob Tremblay brings Jack to vivid life with his portrayal. Brie Larson (winning an Oscar for Best Performance) exposes a character who is tortured and totally focused on protecting her baby.

There's not enough room in this review to capture everything this movie is. You simply have to see it for yourself. As always, I was skeptical, just waiting for the moment when I'd switch to something else. That did not happen. The two hours I spent watching it went by in a flash.

This gets a 10 for quality and craftsmanship by the director. I give it a zero for the way the cop was cast and how the racial issue was exploited. They went to a lot a trouble to find a despicable and stereotypically white trash face. We've had enough of all the virtue signalling. I will not be made to feel guilty because of the sins of our fathers or a handful of bad cops. The narrative is a lie meant to divide. Best way for the elite to control us.

I sometimes share my take on films and TV shows here when they either give me a bad case of cinematic tourista or send me into deliriums of admiration. Other than film school, I haven't spent so much time during these lockdowns exploring the moviesphere and discovering a glittering gem here and there or something you'd scrape off the bottom of your shoe. I've also revisited favourites and discovered that a Breaking Bad, say, is just as good the 16th time around. Netflix has become my movie feeding trough.

A few years ago, when features devolved into an insipid soup of cookiecutter plots featuring two-dimensional superheroes bouncing off skyscrapers and irritating, ugly AF villains, I did my own cancel culture on Hollywood. I refused to go to the cinema. I decided my days as a film fan boy were over. I'd stick to my collection of DVDs and was none the happier. Then HBO happened. Deadwood happened. Six Feet Under happened. And there was The Sopranos. Nothing before or after has satisfied my gluttonous hunger for good stories. I dug a deep hole in the cultural desert and buried feature film. It was dead to me.

I will also skip films that give off that woke vibe. These days, one cannot help but dibble-dabble in the political muck, even in a film review. There's a pervasive foul odour in the zeitgeist. An insane head-first dive into societal woes that has put a sharp focus on certain issues, telling us they're systemic. I suppose that's why so many visible minorities want to immigrate here. Of course, there will always be the few dunderheads of this good Earth who think they're superior to certain groups not in their gene pool. These people are human aberrations. They do not represent the vast majority. This obsession with race and identity has become intolerable for me. It divides. Segregates us into tribes and parachutes us back fifty years when these problems were real. It creates an atmosphere of distrust and hate that sometimes (too often) manifests itself in horrible acts of violence.

The well-meaning but feeble-minded munchkins of La La Land had made it clear moving forward. You can only qualify for an Oscar nomination if your project includes any of a number of diversity points. D. I. E.: Diversity, Inclusion, Equity. Words that represent everything good in our society and tell me instantly what I should avoid. I refuse to be made to feel guilty for the lack of melanin in my skin and the sins of our fathers. It wouldn't have sparked a single synapse in my brain just a few short years ago and I will not succumb to what is the real contagion among us.

As I scrolled through the Netflix thumbnails wondering if I was going to watch Fargo the series for the 30th time, I stopped on a new release. "Oh, here we go." Another virtue signalling whack to the back of my head. I was just about to click the next button when I hesitated. "Wait a sec. Didn't this thing win a bunch of Oscars?" I pondered the poster of a stuck-up black dude sitting in the back of a '62 limo with a white chauffeur who looked like he fell off the FBI's Most Wanted list. What was it going to be? The Babysitter Redux (purely as an academic study of film structure) or Driving Mister Daisy?

What the hell. I love Viggo Mortensen, so Toilet Training Day it was, with my finger strategically on the stop button.

Fifteen minutes later, I was laughing and choking up at what I was experiencing. I haven't been this taken by a film from fade-in to fade-out since Silver Linings Playbook. Dare I say, Casablanca?

An old film associate of mine sprung one on me when I was struggling with a screenplay. "Pull the Italian card when it doubt." Sorry. It never gets old. Penned by Nick Vallelonga, son of the real-life Tony Lip, and directed by Something About Mary's Peter Farrelly, Green Book is the true story of a tough Copacabana bouncer and an accomplished black pianist who set off on a string of performances through the Deep South of the early 1960s. Complications ensue, y'all.

And what is a Green Book? You'll find out soon enough. The revelation is one of the strongest thematic elements I've seen in a film. If a picture is worth a thousand words, this little book is worth an entire library.

Everything about this movie is deliciously edible. Viggo Mortensen as Tony "Lip" Vallelonga pulls off a Bronx goomba with his virtuoso grease ball portrayal and a surprising command of Italian dialect. He even scoffed up a Robert De Niro/Raging Bull beer belly for the role.

Embodying an African-American NYC society bunny known for his talent on the ivory keys is the transcendent Mahershala Ali. No, he's not a pianist. A few months of practice and a stand-in sold it. Ali won his second Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in Green Book, after picking up the award in 2017 for Moonlight. I would have handed a Best Actor to Viggo, but thems the breaks in the fickle marshmallow world of Lotus Land.

The story, dialogue and character arcs are perfect storms. And the cast is peppered with actual Vallelonga family members, adding to its realism and appeal. For those in the know, the Italian Christmas Eve seafood meal is authentic.

I'm watching this again very soon and the screenplay is downloaded, ready to read.

Goodfellas meets 12 Years a Slave.

I'm thinking a lot about this film. I'm thinking, I need to talk to someone about it. Maybe a professional.

Charlie Kaufman has always fascinated me as a screenwriter. Like everyone else who worships him, "Being John Malkovich" was my gateway drug to his genius. His surreal treatment of the human condition challenges my perception of what a story should be. Of what life is. He's funny, but dark. Not for everyone's Netflix and chill evening.

"I'm Thinking of Ending Things" is based on a bestseller by Reid Iain which I haven't read. The film is a psychological thriller, although that can be argued. The supernatural certainly creeps into it with Kaufman's crackerjack use of eerie camera moves, editing and music score.

The pace is excruciatingly slow. You might need a couple of double espressos to make it through. The car ride at the beginning to Jake's parents house in the country takes more than 15 minutes, but the dialogue and interaction between the wonderfully quirky Jessie Buckley and the peccantly loveable Jesse Plemons engages you in some of the most exquisite lines ever put on film.

Toni Collette and David Thewlis as Jake's parents deliver the kind of performance they're known for: edgy, bizarre, mystifying. I can never get enough of Thewlis. See him in Fargo season 3 and you'll be just as hooked. Make sure you watch out for the family border collie. How a dog can put me in stitches is what Kaufman is known for.

When it's over, you might want those two hours from your life back or realize what you just watched was unavoidably cathartic. Except for the ending. As much as I'm a cinematic leech, I couldn't connect to draw blood. Thus, the 7 star rating.

I'm thinking this might just be a beginning. I'm thinking I need to watch this again. Several times. Let it wash over me and not get stuck on its surface. Like water over a rock.

Hereditary meets Crazy, Stupid, Love.

It's a lie. Netflix isn't all chill. Sweat and suffering come with it when you're looking for something good to watch. And it's become harder and harder for me to settle on a show after so much watching.

With a solid 10 on the Binge Meter, Snabba Cash took me on a wild ride last night through the Swedish underground of drugs and murder. It was also a wide-eyed lesson in kinetic entrepreneurship as we follow Leya (the mouth-watering Evin Ahmad) in her struggle to breathe life into her high tech start-up. As far apart as those two worlds are, the ugly similarities came at me like a blazing volley from an Uzi.

Film Noir was suckled by Hollywood for decades. It defined the genre with its washed-up detectives living off mickeys of whiskey as they fell hopelessly in love with some femme fatale who'd be as interested in them as a cat with a celery stick.

Then came Nordic Noir. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Wallander, The Bridge, Iceland's Trapped, Caliphate, to name a few and all priorities on your watch list. The Scandinavian New Wave has brewed the new film elixir.

Everything about Snabba Cash resonates with perfection. Directors Jesper Ganslandt and Måns Månsson have chiseled a boulder of hard rock into a Renaissance sculpture.

The cast is riveting as they take you down this stinking rabbit hole. Dialogue, infused with a hybrid language of ghetto speak, Swedish, Arab and Silicon Valley buzzwords assails the ears as they're being made wild love to. The pace will leave you begging for relief while craving more of its cinematic opiates. I'm not a big fan of Hip Hop, but the music track added to the exhilarating experience. It carried the sequences towards a crashing finale that left me breathless.

One for my top ten list which wants to become a top 100.

State of the art. Totally sold on effects. Great film on a dramatic level. Ignore bad reviews. It's the millisecond attention span crowd yammering.

I managed 5 mins. If cartoons are you thing, skip this one. I don't get it. Just show me the damn movie.

Put your politics aside and see this film for what it is, an excellent example of film-making. Perhaps the best in recent memory. Gripping, thrilling, heart-wrenching. The film will have you glued to your seat. It makes you relive the horror and emotions of the human tragedy we all lived through 5 years ago. Some would ask, why bother? Is it too soon? Experiencing the events of that day once again reminds us of why we must at all costs defend ourselves against this cancer that's infected our lives. I don't care about conspiracies or anyone's agenda, the reality is this DID happen and will happen again if we are not vigilant. And for you Bush haters out there, he's not portrayed in the best light since no one at NORAD could find him or the VP for orders to shoot down hijacked aircraft. Greengrass is a master of the art! Not to be missed.

I'm giving this a 1 even if this movie will be worth the price of admission for most people and even if it will make a killing at the box office. I'm giving it a 1 because Peter Jackson dropped the ball on the "suspension of disbelief" factor. Any fragile beauty like Naomi Watts would have been dead after two minutes with this brute. There are a few scenes where Kong is either running with her in his hand or fighting off dinosaurs as he holds her. There's just no way a human body would survive such extremes. She didn't even have a scratch on her! Not to say that I didn't try to turn off my skepticism or that I didn't find the sequences exciting (more if they were a little shorter). I really wanted to be taken away by this story but it fell flat on its face in that respect. I couldn't wait for it to end. The only thing that kept me in my seat were the effects and I have to say Spielberg did far better in his dino movies - and handled the human element much better. I also didn't buy Naomi Watts and her infatuation with Kong. It was painful to watch and completely ludicrous. Don't even think that this movie comes close to the emotions of Titanic as some critics have said. Even if Kong wore a Di Caprio mask, it's an insult to that great movie to even mention it in the same sentence. Jackson (and Hollywood) really ticked me off with this over-the-top disaster. Next time I'll stay home and watch HBO or Fox if I want real entertainment!

I saw episode one by accident while channel surfing Sunday night. After about 5 minutes, I was hooked. I can still say the same after episode three last night.

The show has the feel and look of a first-class feature film. In fact, this type of cable series should make feature film producers start looking over their shoulders. With shows like this and others like The Sopranos and Six Feet Under, HBO and Showtime have given the industry something to be very worried about - and deservedly so. I go to the movies about once a week and all I can say is Hollywood better get its act together.

The cast is superb, notably Michael Ealy and Oded Fehr. Ealy portrays his character, an undercover FBI agent, with just the right amount of passion, conflict, and boiling rage. Fehr is evil incarnate, although you can say that Dylan's line, "Sympathy for the Devil" is right on the nose here – more on that in a second. What a coup (and how ironic) to have an Israeli actor play an Arab terrorist. In an interview, this gifted actor expressed his revulsion and loathing for what "Farik", his character, represents. It made the part the most challenging thing he's done so far. Knowing that, as you watch him execute his nefarious plans, makes him even more compelling. Casting non-Arabs to play the other terrorists was a stroke of genius on the part of the creators of the show, Cyrus Voris and Ethan Reiff. These people are like us and live among us…a disturbing thought and a very real possibility that cranks the fear factor way up.

The interesting thing about the way that these Islamic extremists are presented to us is that you can't help feeling sympathy for them. They are likable and, in their own warped way, virtuous. That's another aspect of the show that pulls at the heart-strings and adds to the biting conflict that is the mark of a brilliant drama.

You can bet that I'll be watching the rest of the series being broadcast back to back (there is a God!) for the next two weeks. They are replaying most of the episodes throughout this week, so if you missed the first ones, you'll have the opportunity to catch up. I suggest you start with Ep. 1 if you can although each one stands very well on its own.