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Sat Aug 08 2026 20:15 July Film Roundup:
- The Hunt for Red October (1990): Really enjoyable thriller. I was thinking there might be an extra twist vis-a-vis what Sean Connery's character really intended to do with the sub, but then there was a scene where Jack Ryan was putting forth his theory and all the brass were shitting on it, and I was like "well, the protagonist has spoken, that's it for twists." Still a fun film. Gates McFadden has a blink-and-you'll-miss-it role as Jack Ryan's wife.
I think Sumana would want me to mention that Jack Ryan has a bad habit of leaking sensitive national security information when he talks to himself in infodumps. You can fix this plot hole and restore your enjoyment of the movie by simply putting your finger in front of your face to cover Alec Baldwin's mouth, so that it looks like he's doing an internal monologue in voiceover.
- Listers (2025): Watch it on Youtube! A charming documentary about birdwatching, brotherhood, and mistaking the measurement for the thing being measured. The bit that sticks with me is the cautionary tale of the guy who's so competitive that he saw on the news somebody had the biggest Christmas light display in the area, and he got really into Christmas lights just to outdo that guy. I hate to think of what happens when he watches the Olympics. PS: there's a California condor in this movie, one of my favorite birds.
- Knightriders (1981): Like many moviegoers, I watched this on the strength of the awesome poster, and was disappointed by the lack of time travel. Also the movie's way too long. Like a lot of baby boomers (Peter David, J. Michael Straczynski), George Romero has a self-indulgent fascination with Arthurian romance. Maybe if I, too, was a successful director or comics writer, I'd feel the lure of comparing myself to the semi-mythological leader of a team of knights. But more likely Monty Python and the Holy Grail just made it impossible for anyone of my generation to take it seriously.
After the initial disappointment wore off, I liked the first 30 minutes of Knightriders quite a bit. It was cool to see an old-timey ren faire, the stunts were cool, and Steven King(!) was fun as the strawman rube. But pretty soon I tired of it and the main thing the film had going for it was its out-of-nowhere beef with Bakersfield.
See, Knightriders is clearly filmed in Pennsylvania and equally clearly takes place in Pennsylvania. But very important to the plot is a real crappy place called Bakersfield, with corrupt law enforcement like you wouldn't believe. In the climax of the movie, the sheriff of Bakersfield is given a swirlie from a soft-serve ice cream machine. So I have to assume George Romero had a bad experience with Bakersfield (understandable) and decided to make it the laughingstock of this long, weird movie. Sometimes they say the location is a character in a movie, but rarely is that character the comic relief.