I mean, I actually hung around work for an extra hour or so because that meant I could come close to rolling off the bus and into the Brattle for the DocYard presentation of Spettacolo, which I missed at IFFBoston last year despite being curious about the new one from the makers of Marwencol. Unfortunately, I really wasn't into it; it seemed like a decent enough movie, but I was in and out. Remind me to catch it on Prime sometime.
Tuesday night was the first game in my Red Sox season ticket package, and despite it being something like 38 degrees Fahrenheit, which is not idea. What is ideal - Chris Sale pitching and the Sox hitters pulverizing the Yankees' supposed ace. It was fantastic really, with the one obnoxiously loud Yankees fan in my section eventually getting shut up after having shrieked at Aaron Judge's home run like it did more than turn a 5-0 game to a 5-1 game. My seat is right behind the visiting dugout, and there was a point in the 9-run sixth inning where a guy yelled "you're next!" at the guy warming up like it was a threat. Which it was; the pitcher loaded the bases and then saw Mookie Betts hit a grand slam. It was fantastic.
Since it was a Yankees series, I kind of stayed in and watched NESN the next couple nights, and then headed back to the Brattle on Friday for Claire's Camera, in for a quick weekend engagement kind of tied to a Hong Sang-soo retrospetive at the Harvard Film Archive. It's kind of neat. The next night was Big Fish & Begonia, which I thought was going to be subtitled, but was shown dubbed instead. I suspet the original version is better, but wasn't quite up for seeing it a second time to be sure.
Finally, on Sunday, I went to the Icon for Rampage, and you know what was weird? There was a credit for "inspired by the Rampage video game", but no company credit like you'd usually see. Has it just been lost in bankruptcies and mergers and such, or has it been swallowed by Warner? Odd. They also started a thing where local chefs design a popcorn bucket, with this one featuring pecans. Weirdly sticky.
Still more BUFF reviews catch-up to do, and I'm always updating my Letterboxd account.
Spettacolo
N/A (out of four)
Seen on 9 April 2018 in the Brattle Theatre (The DocYard, DCP)
I was just not up for this movie like I thought I was going to be, zoning out badly at several pints and really not connecting with things brought up during the post-film discussion at all. It would up feeling like an interesting idea that just never had the right details cohere. That's how it works with documentaries sometimes - the story they saw in the beginning didn't really emerge, and what did became self-aware in a way that didn't quite work for me.
Rampage
* * ¾ (out of four)
Seen on 15 April 2018 in Showplace Icon Boston #2 (first-run, RealD 3D DCP)
A good-enough giant monster movie, which isn't a bad result if you want to see giant monsters level a city and fight every once in a while. It's not smart like the original Godzilla (or its recent reboot), and it doesn't have any single bit of action as delightful as Gipsy Danger picking up a ship and bludgeoning an alien to death in Pacific Rim. When it does actually have giant mutated animals fighting, though, there is some fun to be had, with the last act being a pretty well-sustained brawl.
It doesn't hurt that Dwayne Johnson never just coats even in a movie where he'll be upstaged by lots of digital effects, either - he's always giving his all and has a game partner in Naomie Harris, who makes for a love interest/scientist that's a lot of fun on her own. It gets sketchy after that - Malin Akerman and Jeffrey Dean Morgan sometimes seem to be chewing a bit too much scenery, even given the plot they've got to work with - especially given the good work by the mocap/effets guys to bring the big albino ape to life.
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