What to Watch on HBO Max Oct. 1 - 15

So much crap on streaming, what’s a film nerd/nut, cineaste to do?

Ignore the splash screens, read this list!

Leave behind AI-generated suggestions of "more like this" that contain 90% stuff you don’t want to watch.

Definitions:

Film Nerd: You’ll watch Andrei Rublev willingly

Film Nut: No Andrei Rublev.

(I will do a separate post for each streaming service that has anything worthy, starting here with HBO Max)

HBO Max What to Watch This Week Oct. 1 to 15, 2022

Film Nerd

The Méliès Mystery (2021, Eric Lange) Watch one man age through time:

No, but seriously, he’s a filmmaker, one of the first (almost the first) But he was definitely the first to do many things. This documentary is NEW which is something to be said for this towering figure to Film Nerds, and it has NEW information and, if you already knew a lot, it's got NEW perspective. It definitely reinvigorated my enthusiasm for Méliès, so I highly recommend giving this buried treasure a whirl.

 

Spielberg (2017, Susan Lacy) Run the gamut watching this after the above. Okay I hate Spielberg, there I said it, but even I loved this documentary, because it was him for himself, not trying to be anything else, they covered most of his movies, and they featured the film brat culture he grew up in and gave a really good impression of the historical setting, and the zeitgeist.

But there’s fresh interviews with Scorsese, DiCaprio, others! It’s a focused perspective of viewing an epochal time of transition through perhaps my least favorite lens, but the perspective is really too valuable to miss. And the number of times that his films were thought to be disasters (before they came out) does generate some sympathy to root for this guy. Sharing a fellow filmmaker’s perspective of what goes through his mind on set is really fun. Love him or hate him, you’ll know him better, and honestly that’s worth something.

For Heaven’s Sake (1926, Sam Taylor) As Harold Lloyd silent comedies go, people do not pitch this one to you, and instead are always saying to watch Safety Last (1923), but this one has some even more amazing stunts and very elaborate comedy bits that start from a simple idea and escalate to grand scope. There’s a couple of train stunts I really wasn’t expecting.

While I saw this in a theater out in the wilds of Agoura Hills at a Silent Film Society screening – and yes, Harold Lloyd does play FAR better with an audience of more than 2 people – to me, this did hold up on the small screen with good musical accompaniment. The film quality is also great, so while enjoying the comedy, you get a “you’re right there” feeling of back in time in 1926, esp. interesting as Lloyd always has that cutting-edge (for the time) approach. He seems the most irreverent, so if you want the smartest, winking-est comedy, it tended to be Lloyd, so you get a real sense of the “times” as well.

Film Nut

Last Night in Soho (2021, Edgar Wright) Ah, Edgar Wright what has befallen you. Too witty/edgy with Simon Pegg to be offered a vehicle of equal wit/edge without him. Trying to find your way without him in the modern film universe, but honestly not quite carving out a distinct auteur niche like all those you admire. But much more film-smart and engaging than most mainstream films these days. This one started a bit slow, but it gets cooking eventually. Watched the whole movie, didn’t realize that was Diana Rigg. (That's Simon Pegg below (I mean Terrence Stamp).)

The Batman (2022, Matt Reeves) It’s not that bad! I mean, it’s kind of weird to watch basically a redo of the earlier phase. The push-pull of keeping what they want from Nolan’s while trying to be new is pretty interesting. The dull deadpan acting of Pattinson and Zoë Kravitz pretty much sinks this from a strong recommend,

but honestly there is enough fun and scope and great cinematography that I do recommend. It’s especially refreshing that the film truly takes its time in many scenes. That is really the reason for posting this here, as we really need to fight against the mainstream ADD/ADHD presentation of many films. So even the tiniest sliver of anything that is still trying to be cinema might be worth a look.

Blue Velvet (1986, David Lynch) This is the point at which David Lynch went too dark. And it’s also the “film school” David Lynch movie (the one they show you a lot in film classes.)

It’s hard to say Eraserhead (as stupendously great as it is) is what David Lynch will become. He went Eraserhead --> The Elephant Man --> Dune and then this. So was the “David Lynch” we know really in the cards yet at Eraserhead? Couldn’t you say this is the first David Lynch film?

Stranger Than Paradise (1984, Jim Jarmusch) In the kitchen-sink splash screens we see when we log in, there’s just too much. More than I ever, I want to unplug to the simplest films, the least ADD, and imagine sitting in a theater having plonked down my bucks (paper money) to see this, and start watching and be like, “This is all that happens?”, and eventually not minding.

Ahhh, a breath of fresh air. Truly very little. Deadpan (well it's Jarmusch), and super-minimalist, you wonder how it got made kind of thing. It does have some recognizable faces John Lurie and Richard Edson, just in case you were too uncomfortable.