Podcast: Raymond & Ray & Decision to Leave

Raymond & Ray & Decision to Leave

Greetings Programs! This week on the podcast, Matt and Simon take a look at a pair of wayward bothers in the new AppleTV+ release Raymond & Ray and the Cannes Film Festival Best Director winning Decision to Leave from the great Park Chan-wook. Will there be hot takes? Only one way to find out! Find links to listen (and JustWatch powered streaming links for each movie) below.

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Podcast: RRR & The Northman

RRR & The Northman

This week on the Awesome Friday Podcast, we’re talking about two big 2022 historical epic films. First up is the Tollywood breakout RRR from director S. S. Rajamouli and stars Ram Charam and N. T. Rama Rao Jr. Second, the latest from The Witch and The Lighthouse director Robert Eggers, The Northman.

You can listen to this episode right here on this page (after the jump) or wherever you listen to podcasts, and there are links to both titles wherever they are streaming powered by JustWatch.

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Marvel’s Moon Knight is a bit disjointed

Moon Knight

Comics are weird. There’s no denying this simple fact, and there’s no use trying. This fact is universal and can be a barrier to entry for new fans. Sometimes 50 years of lore is a lot to wrap your head around. One of the great strengths of Marvel’s ongoing cinematic universe is that initially, at least, it distilled all that lore into something easier to swallow. Twenty-plus films later, its greatest strength is that when a new character walks onto the screen and says, “I’m a man with split personalities, one of whom in the warrior avatar of the Egyptian moon god Khonshu and I’m here to punish the wicked” most people’s reaction will be “sure, that makes sense.”

Of course, this can also be a flaw –as it is with Marvel’s latest series– in which there is so little explanation that there is almost no reason to care. There is no trial by which Oscar Isaac’s Marc Spectre obtained his powers or much in explaining his back story; he walks on-screen fully formed. Well, half-formed, because if you glossed over it in the previous paragraph, this is a man with multiple identities. This show is, in a word, a lot.

Being a lot isn’t necessarily a deal-breaker, but while there are many things to love in this series, there are just as many that make it a complicated watch.

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14 Movies to Watch on Valentine’s Day No Matter Your Relationship Status That Don’t Involve Nicholas Sparks

10-things-swing

Love is in the air everywhere you look around. You’ve got the best of my love. I just can’t get enough of your love, babe. I don’t care who you are, where you’re from, what you did, as long as you love me. I don’t care what they say I’m in love with you. All you need is love. Might as well face it you’re addicted to love. Come and get your love. Can you feel the love tonight?

You can’t?

Don’t worry, you’re not alone. And there’s nothing wrong with that even if all the giant displays of red hearts and fluffy things and greeting cards and hand holding couples all over the mall are trying to tell you otherwise. There’s a lot of love in the world that doesn’t fit into cardboard boxes or perfectly co-ordinate with an arbitrary date in February.

Contrary to the current array of movies playing on television (AMC is playing Titanic back-to-back for 18 hours straight. The boat sank in 3.) there are also a lot of love stories in film. If you’re looking for something to watch tonight but don’t feel like crying alone while watching the Notebook (the tired stereotype of single women on this day), let me recommend some alternatives.

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Cymbeline Trailer Combines The Bard With Bikers And Bullets

cymbeline-poster

Shakespeare is the best writer who ever lived. His words carry such beauty, brutality, humour and psychosis that we’ve seen a number attempts to update the context of his stories, with varying degrees of success. Here’s a trailer for new version of the lesser-known *Cymbeline* from director Michael Almereyda, who you may remember from his version of *Hamlet* starring Ethan Hawke in 2000. Take a look.

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Before Midnight Trailer, In Which We Spend Another Day with Jesse and Celine

Before Midnight

It was 18 years ago we first spent the night with Jesse and Celine watching them fall in love, and 9 years later that we spent the day with them reconnecting and rekindling the relationship they never ended up having. Now, another 9 years on we get to spend another day with them to see what it’s like now that they are together.

I rather liked the first two movies in this series. I don’t know many people who grew up in the 1990s who don’t, actually. It’s also just been interesting having snapshots of this relationship at different points so I’m actually pretty excited to see what’s going on in this third instalment.

Anyone else?