Re-watching it today it occurred to me that Apocalypse Now is, in addition to every other superlative that has ever been thrown at it, one of the great contemporary films noir. Tweaking the familiar setup, Coppola places his loner anti-hero on the "one last job" in the middle of an absurdist, Dantean war picture. The classic expression of existential despair in post-WWII cinema is re-inscribed as surrealist opera.

Come, gentle viewers and let me tell you the tale of the vampyr slayers.

Of course it took Joss Whedon to realize on film the fact that superheroes are freaks with outsized personalities in tights, while maintaining a humorous seriousness. All of these things have been done before, but they come together nicely here. Whedon even manages to develop character in the midst of the apocalyptic battle finale. Oh, and the Buffy callbacks were fun too.

One day the two dozen or so Anderson acolytes on Mubi will expand into the hundreds, and that is the day Criterion will release the Resident Evil films in a beautiful Eclipse set. Or at least I imagine that is how it will go down.

In the immortal words of Rupert Giles: "Don't speak Latin in front of the books, Xander."

I finally saw L'Atalante today, despite having it in my possession since New Year's. French cinema, you now have a new (old) standard of beauty with which you must contend.

So happy to see that racial equality was achieving without, say, anyone getting shot.

"You are my future wiiiife."

The Oscars: DEAN there, done that. Three cheers for Craig Pelton!

Archetype, upon archetype, upon archetype, upon novelty, upon shaky cam, upon archetype.

It's not without a certain ridiculous charm. Really, it's a movie that only exists so that children can be squished with large panes of glass. At least there's an acknowledgement of the simple pleasures.

"Turtle Rap" is the shit.

There can be little doubt that this is the best American comedy since Linklater's "Dazed and Confused" in '93. Give it another year and we can say "best in two decades."

It's taken me years to come around to "Rushmore," but I finally appreciate it for what it is rather than disliking it for what it isn't. I think that it's Anderson's least outwardly funny film, but it still works because there are elements of genuine joy and invention. Max is a self-absorbed, hugely unlikable character, but partnered with Murray and Williams they expand the coming-of-age genre to encompass all life.

Has my vote for worst date movie since "Oldboy."

Floating Weeds on DVD... it's a Christmas miracle!

It is Fincher's strange gift that he manages to turn an adaptation of a bestselling potboiler thriller into the darkest, least accessible film of his career. His last three pictures have seen Fincher blossom into a truly important filmmaker, and it is the way he pulls human depth out of the stubborn procedures, organization, repetition of everyday life that makes him unique in the contemporary American mainstream.

What began as grisly, gritty realism in Zombie's first go-around becomes a bizarro, gritty (sur)realism in this one. Zombie is proving himself a formidable filmmaker, and he hits almost all of his marks here. Of course, it doesn't hurt that he has Brad Dourif at the helm, maybe the most underrated character actor in the business right now.

Harvey Keitel literally sounds like a wounded animal.

That's a good thing, by the way. "John from Cincinnati" was a hella good show. It was just way too oblique for most people (which is understandable, but lamentable).

Clint shows admirable restraint throughout the first two acts, but alas, in the final act he falls prey to his basest instincts: slow motion, histrionic music and excessive cross-cutting. Undoubtably flawed but for the most part a fascinating movie.

The gods be praised! I am now the owner of the 'Complete Vigo' Criterion set!

"I'm runnin' this monkey farm now mister, and I wanna know what the fuck you're doing with my time!" - The late Captain Rhodes

Charlie Day definitely stands out, and Jason Bateman continues to prove that he'll never have a character as good as Michael Bluth ever again.

A workable excuse for Brian De Palma to put together his nifty little set pieces? Basically.

I'm continually astounded as to how most audiences so totally miss the satiric heart of Verhoeven's American period. If this isn't a cruelly opulent repackaging of the American dream, I don't know what is.

"Those impoverished Cuban peasants have had it too good for too long. So, y'know, it's totally cool to completely obliterate their rickety-ass shanty towns with our brand new Hummer." This is what actually goes on in Michael Bay's head.

All hail the Lord of the 2.35:1 Steadicam rig!

There are no steamships, no volcanoes and no South American guerillas, but in its own way this is as radical a film as Herzog has ever made. His use of 3D is astonishing in how it deconstructs cinematic space, just as the content of the film deconstructs human experiences of time. We may be trapped in history, as Herzog notes, but Chauvet is a space that transcends it.

Nick Ray's take on the western is a gaudy, stone-cold pulp classic. This film could be granted 'masterpiece' status for Joan Crawford's eyebrows and lips alone.