I realized that I’ve been writing about movies on this blog for over three years now. My August 2023 movie blog post featured only three movies (and one series); since then I’ve certainly deepened my interest in film and started watching far more movies each month. Most of the time I stick to watching things I’ve never seen before, but this month had an unusual number of rewatches: the TIFF Lightbox’s summer Christopher Nolan series allowed me to revisit the entire Dark Knight trilogy on 35mm, plus my recent resubscription to Disney Plus got me in the mood to revisit some childhood classics.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day
United States of America | 2026 | 145m | English
Hmm, I seem to be in the minority here, but I thought Spider-Man: Brand New Day was just okay. Everyone is saying how much more emotional and grounded this movie is than its predecessors… I don’t know, man, to me it felt like a very typical Marvel movie experience. (Only with a lamer than usual post-credits scene!) The Sam Raimi Spider-Man films had the benefit of not being connected to some extended universe of a million other movies and TV series that I have not watched. Even though they were made with the foreknowledge that sequels would be inevitable, those early 2000s movies were self-contained in a way that I miss.
My biggest problem with this probably has more to do with the theater experience than the movie. I get that 3D movies are always projected more darkly than 2D movies, but the screen at the Fairview Mall Cineplex was already incredibly dark to begin with. I genuinely had a hard time discerning what was onscreen for much of the film because it was so, so dark. I might need to avoid 3D movies and/or that theater in the future.
Toy Story 2
United States of America | 1999 | 92m | English
I certainly have seen the first Toy Story many times, but the second? Apart from seeing it at my own birthday party in the theater back when it came out (at which I received a snippet from its 35mm film reel), I am not sure I ever watched it again after that point.
With my renewed Disney Plus subscription and on a kick to revisit childhood classics this month, I rewatched this sequel only to find that it’s just as clever and creative as the first film. Really, I was floored at how tight this script is—the way it calls back to itself and to the first film. Then that scene with Jessie recounting her past? I was not prepared for how emotional that would be. Pixar peaked early and then somehow just kept getting better.
A Bug’s Life
United States of America | 1998 | 95m | English
There was a time in my life where I thought “Who ordered the poo-poo platter?” was the absolute funniest line of dialogue in all of cinema.
A Bug’s Life was among my earliest favorite movies. I had several toys—Flik and his contraption, Dim the beetle. I just looked up an image of the McDonald’s toy line and a wave of nostalgia hit me.
I hadn’t actually rewatched A Bug’s Life since that time. This tends to get left out of discussions of early Pixar masterworks like Toy Story, Monster’s Inc., or Finding Nemo. On an objective level, that’s probably warranted since it doesn’t quite hit the heights of those films. But to me, A Bug’s Life is still an absolute classic. It’s something that I’d like to watch with my own son when he’s old enough to comprehend movies.
Small Soldiers
United States of America | 1998 | 110m | English
Functionally, this might be one of my longest “watchlisted” movies ever. As a young child, my cousin got to see this movie but I was blocked because of the PG-13 rating. It loomed large in my mind for years as essentially the “edgy Toy Story.” Now, having finally seen it, I’m baffled at the rating because it is one of the tamest PG-13s I have ever seen. Of course it isn’t as good as Toy Story but it’s still decently fun. I think I would have enjoyed it a lot more if I had actually had the chance to see it as a kid.
Batman Begins
United States of America, United Kingdom | 2005 | 140m | English, Urdu, Chinese
I first watched this on a DVD rental with a friend soon after it originally came out. I didn’t remember much other than a few Scarecrow scenes and the feeling that I didn’t follow the whole thing or vibe with it all that much. With the TIFF Lightbox offering the chance to rewatch the whole Christopher Nolan Batman trilogy on film this month, I revisited Batman Begins and… enjoyed it! It is a little overly serious given some silly plot points at times, and it often falls victim to that 2000s shaky cam that makes the actions scenes more disorienting than satisfying, but it’s a solid origin story for the character. “I won’t kill you. But I don’t have to save you”—is anyone else grappling with the political undertones of that line? Batman Begins is a prime example I can point to in my thesis that most superhero stories are inherently right wing.
The Hole
Taiwan, France | 1998 | 95m | Chinese
The length of the very first scene ought to have been enough to clue me in on what kind of movie I was about to endure. I have to believe there are more effective ways of depicting ennui than long, long takes where we watch people sleep motionlessly.
I lived through COVID as a single man in a studio apartment with remote school/work under one of the most heavy-handed lockdown regimes in North America—I know on an intimate level what extreme isolation in a pandemic feels like. This movie did not convey it. I didn’t care about the characters, I wasn’t impressed by the cinematography, I wasn’t intrigued by the apocalyptic situation outside the walls of the apartment; at best I can say that the hokey musical numbers were tolerable.
The Hole is one of those semi-old foreign art house movies that impresses, well, the kinds of people who use Letterboxd. But I’m enough of a contrarian that I can admit that I found it dull, lifeless, and eye-wateringly boring.
Toy Story 3
United States of America | 2010 | 103m | English, Spanish
Alright, the big one—I had heard for years and years how emotional and moving this film was, but I hadn’t actually ever seen it despite growing up loving the first Toy Story. Now, having finally watched number 3, I understand. It’s unbelievable the emotion the filmmakers managed to achieve in the last scene. It’s as perfect a capstone to this trilogy as there could possibly be. The furnace scene, too, is a standout in crafting genuinely harrowing tension and then absolute catharsis. The early parts of this film felt to me like a retread of what happened in 2, which is why I’m not quite feeling a perfect 5 for this. Still, Toy Story is clearly one of the all time great movie trilogies, even outside of the family-friendly genre.
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma
United Kingdom, United States of America | 2026 | 112m | English
I might need a rewatch to totally understand what was going on in the last part—where what was “real” and what was allegory—but I was impressed by how Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma managed to tell what’s evidently such a deeply personal story through genre tropes and tongue-in-cheek references. Not really a horror film, not really a slasher film… it’s an “elevated” romance drama. (And not necessarily “woke,” to quote the film—I joined the laughter in my theater when the main character, watching the in-universe Camp Miasma movie, remarked, “This part is transphobic,” only to be told, “Shut up.”) This is a smart movie that I think people will be talking about and revisiting in years to come. The heavy CGI is a bit of a disappointment, but again, it’s really not about the slasher violence, so if that’s why you’re here, just put on your favorite Friday the 13th VHS tape for the umpteenth time.
Watching this on a clean 35mm print was really the perfect way to experience this!
The Dark Knight
United Kingdom, United States of America | 2008 | 152m | English, Chinese
I told myself for years that this was the best superhero movie ever made. Now, I think Spiderman 2 might have a slight edge. Christopher Nolan’s habit of dense storytelling with a pace that doesn’t always give you time to internalize the intricacies of everything that’s happening shows up here, but there are so many knockout, iconic scenes that I can easily overlook any shortcomings.
The Dark Knight Rises
United Kingdom, United States of America | 2012 | 165m | English
Didn’t realize until this viewing how much it was inspired by Doctor Zhivago.
My memory of the first time I saw The Dark Knight Rises was of feeling like it was long and that I couldn’t really connect with it. Well, it is indeed pretty long, but this time I had a much better time with it, which was probably helped by the fact that I watched the entire trilogy in quick succession thanks to TIFF’s Christopher Nolan series.
Sleepaway Camp
United States of America | 1983 | 85m | English
Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma definitely put me in the mood to watch more of the kinds of 80s slashers that it’s referencing. I’d seen Friday the 13th already. But Sleepaway Camp? Nope. My expectations weren’t exactly high… but I liked this! The practical effects of the kills are surprisingly good. There’s enough goofiness in the characters and acting to keep things funny and interesting. And the ending—which I didn’t know going in—well, I see how directly it influenced Teenage Sex and Death and Camp Miasma. It’s sure… something.
Dunkirk
United Kingdom, United States of America | 2017 | 107m | English, French, German
I had the chance to watch this at the TIFF Lightbox in 70mm. “Why make the drive out there,” I thought, “when the 4K I have at home looks so good?”
And it does. I still think Dunkirk is one of the best-looking 4K discs I own. And its famously sparse dialogue made for a good movie to watch subtitled with the volume low while I had my infant son to myself at home, sleeping peacefully on my chest.
Let’s talk about the movie itself. Dunkirk is mostly pretty great—excelling in the cinematography (especially all those aerial scenes) and the tense sound design. I’m not sure the editing around the parallel timelines always works in the film’s favor—I think it needlessly defuses some of the suspense. Viewers frequently need to remember what was happening in a previous scene of different characters on a different day to understand why their heart is supposed to be pumping when we cut back to those situations. But like all Christopher Nolan movies, it lends itself to rewatches so you can better understand how all the parts click together.
We’re All Going to the World’s Fair
United States of America | 2021 | 86m | English
Wanted to watch this before it leaves the Criterion Channel this month. I’m intrigued to see the other movies by the director of something as unique as Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma. (Well, mostly I want to see I Saw the TV Glow since that seems to have such an intense cult following. We’ll get there eventually.)
We’re All Going to the World’s Fair had potential, I think. It tries to capture a feeling of growing up extremely online, of isolation, of angst and depression. I don’t think I am the only one of my generation to be able to relate to that. I want to say the movie succeeded because I would want to watch something that artfully captures those feelings in a way that only someone roughly my age or younger would be able to. But ultimately there’s just not a lot here; the slow cinema approach didn’t have me chewing on scenes of profundity as much as it had me bored. The closest thing to a justification for this pace was the Skinnamarink-esque slow burn uncertainty and dread that built with every flickering light or between-video loading screen; but once it became clear that there wouldn’t be any actual horror, the intrigue dissipated and never really came back.
I put it on 2x speed early on and it still felt slow. With this being such an internet-brained movie, artificially speeding up the playback didn’t even feel like it was going against the spirit of the film. I watched it on my phone—the idea of watching it in a theater actually feels inappropriate. As a 30-minute short film this might have been great!
Other Movies I Saw This Month
- Toy Story (1995) [5/5]
- Lisztomania (1975) [2/5]
- Dog Movie (2023) [3/5]
- Die Hard (1988) [3.5/5]
- Con Air (1997) [3/5]
- The Conversation (1974) [3.5/5]
- Song of the South (1946) [3/5]
- Targets (1968) [4.5/5]
- The Sting (1973) [2.5/5]
- Harakiri (1962) [4.5/5]
Best Movies I Saw This Month
- Toy Story
- Toy Story 2
- Toy Story 3
- A Bug’s Life
- The Dark Knight
- Targets
- Harakiri
Worst Movies I Saw This Month
- The Hole
- We’re All Going to the World’s Fair
- Lisztomania
